A Certain Technological Annihilaser
by Fifteen1413
Summary: For Hikaru, a ten year old level-2 child error, the thought of becoming a hero never really held much appeal. However, when her friends end up the target of deadly attacks, she reluctantly becomes Academy City's youngest vigilante. Armed only with the ability to make blue light, Hikaru is forced to be creative to get the edge she needs. [Stars OC, heavy support from Railgun girls]
1. Optics 1-0

"LASF9 has a refractive index of... 1.87, and an extinction coefficient of 1.58 * 10-7 m-1 for light with a wavelength of 460 nm." the little girl said, concentrating on keeping the numbers in her head. "It has a reflectance of 0.093, and a Brewster's angle equal to 61.945°." she paused, thinking. "This makes it significantly worse than FK51A, at least at 460 nm. FK51A has a refractive index of 1.49, an extinction coefficient of 1.03 * 10-8 m-1, and a reflectance of only 0.039."

"But FK51A is way more expensive." A young man cautioned. "It could cost you upwards of 500,000 ¥ for a single lens, whereas LASF9, while hardly inexpensive, will only run you maybe 80,000 ¥ per lens."

"I can't let costs keep me from getting better results. In my two lens design, the FK51A will end up being almost 8% more efficient than the LASF9." the girl said.

"Yeah, but you're not the one paying for it." he said, sighing.

"You told me that if I learned the physics, produced the blueprint, and was able to provide an oral defense of the validity of my device, you would buy me the materials that I needed to build it." she said, pouting. "You never put a price limit on it."

"That was because I asked a grade schooler to prove themselves to possess a university level knowledge of optics. I didn't think you'd actually manage it." he shook his head, looking at the six pages of professional grade blueprints on the table in front of him. "Some of my fellow researchers couldn't have done this, and they work with optics for a living. I figured I was safe."

"You fail to understand my determination." the girl said, grinning.

"Yes, that's correct." he said flatly. "Hikaru, I don't understand why you need this device at all, let alone why you'd need it for an application where an 8% efficiency difference would matter. You're a ten year old girl, and this is..." he shook his head again.

"An internal reflectance chamber designed to generate a tight beam of coherent 460 nm wavelength light from a-" Hikaru began, but he cut her off.

"It's a beam weapon." he said evenly.

"Y-yes. It's, uh, a beam weapon." Hikaru said quietly.

"Hikaru..." he sighed. "What could you possibly need this for?"

"Defense." she said defensively.

"What kind of situations do you get into that a beam weapon would be a suitable form of defense?" he said, a little worry creeping into his tones. "Especially a beam weapon like this one. You do realize... no, of course you do. You know exactly what the resultant beam would be capable of. You've probably put a lot of thought into it."

"Two hundred and forty-three millimeters of steel per second penetration at 3KW." she said quietly. "A 0.04 second exposure to the right area should be fatal in most cases."

"So you fully intended it to be a deadly weapon." he looked at her, confusion on his face. "Why?"

"There are kids my age walking around with deadly weapons already." she said. "I'd rather be one of them than be at their whims."

"That's different and you know it." he said quietly.

"How?" she asked, a touch of anger in her voice. "Just because it's a 'natural ability' doesn't make esper powers any less of a weapon. Most level 3 espers could kill someone if they really tried it, and all level 4's are easily capable of it. No one would bat an eye if I was trying to hone my ability through the 'normal' way, even if it became just as deadly in the process. But build a device to try to give myself an edge, and suddenly it's some big deal." she kicked the edge of the table softly in frustration. "There's nothing expressly special about esper powers that makes them acceptable for people to use, or at least there shouldn't be. If there is, that's just a form of systemic elitism and you know it."

"Ten year old's shouldn't be talking like that." he said quietly.

"Most ten year old's don't have an I.Q. of 183, most weren't stuck reading adult literature from age 6, and most were raised by parents instead of a distant, barely present pseudo-older brother figure." she said pointedly.

"I'm... working on it." he said softly.

"Whatever." she sighed. "Look, I guess the LASF9 lenses will be fine if you're really so worried about cost. But if you aren't going to help me at all, I'll get some normal window glass and carve the lenses myself. I can get commercial grade mirrors without too much trouble, you can find cheap polarizing lenses in 3d glasses, and I'll think of something for the casing. I'm going to make this thing, one way or the other. You can either give me the tools to do it well, or I can hurt myself in the process of doing it poorly, but I'm going to do it."

"What happened to you?" he asked softly. "I know I don't spend nearly as much time with you as I should, but something this big even I would have picked up on. It's like you were a completely different person just a week ago." he cupped her hands in his. "There is a difference between esper powers and something like this, Hikaru, and it has nothing to do with power or advantage. I can take this weapon out of your hands, but you can't shut off someone's powers. They can't chose not to have them. I would disarm everyone of any weapon that I could, unless they had a very good reason for having that weapon. So, tell me. What is your reason? Why do you, one of those lucky enough to get to choose whether or not to be one, wish to make a weapon out of yourself?"

"Because I have to live surrounded by other weapons." she said. "Because every day I have to sit in a classroom containing no less than five people capable of killing me, because I eat lunch with three of them, follow the same route home as one of them, frequent a park that holds maybe eight or more at any one time, walk through streets in a city with thousands of them. You have your own protections. You're a R&D researcher for a big name optics company. The places you visit, the districts you live in, they're the safe ones, the ones under complete control. You don't really live in the city, not in the way that I do. If you did, you wouldn't even ask why I feel the need to have some real way of protecting myself." she stared steadily into his eyes. "In this world, only power gets listened to. Power can be achieved in many different ways. One is through money. One is through fame. One is by esper level. One is by the connections you have with people who've achieved one of the other three. I don't have access to the first one, and I won't for a long time to come, if ever. The second has its own risks associated with it, on top of also being largely out of my reach. I'm not making much progress with the third, and I handily fail the fourth. If I want to have my voice heard, if I want to not simply be tossed around by the whims of the people who have found their own power in their own way, I have to get some for myself. So I've opted to take option five. If I can't get strong enough naturally, I can use the greatest power afforded to humanity to make up the difference; namely, my brain. I'm going to forge my own path, gain my own power, and get my voice heard. I refuse to let others dictate how I live my life. This is my security, my vote, my voice, my hope. This is how I get heard."

He looked down at her, not saying a word. Silence filled the space between them, the ten year old girl and her twenty-one year old caretaker, tension building in the quiet. His eyes passed over her slowly, this little girl who spoke like an adult and held a jaded worldview, yet still had the determination inside of her to challenge the standing order, the childlike surety that she really could change the world.

If he helped her, she was going to get herself killed. But if he didn't, she'd get herself killed faster.

"FK51A, right?" he said, sighing.

The girl grinned.

A Certain Technological Annihilaser

An A Certain Magical Index/A Certain Scientific Railgun Fanfiction

 _\- Four days previously -_

"Hi-ka-ru!" A short blond girl leaned over Hikaru's desk, enunciating each syllable of her name slowly and deliberately. "Hikaru, Hikaru, Hikaru, Hikaru!"

"What?!" Hikaru groaned, lifting her head off of her desk with visible effort. She blinked blearily in the harsh white of the florescent lights, slowly resolving her friend's face through blurry eyes.

"I finally did it!" she smiled brightly, shoving a marked index card into Hikaru's face. Hikaru had to scan it over twice before her brain registered what was written on the card. Through her fatigue, she managed to grin back at her friend.

"I told you if you kept at it you'd make it eventually." Hikaru said. "Congratulations, Sayaka. You're officially an esper now." she feigned a sad look. "I guess you don't need me anymore, hun?"

"Oh, don't be silly." Sayaka said, punching Hikaru's shoulder. "I didn't stick around with you because you had powers and I didn't."

"No, of course not. You stuck around with me so you could cheat off of my homework." Hikaru said.

"That was, like, one time." Sayaka said. "Trust me, I learned my lesson. I couldn't even pronounce half of those words." she sighed happily, then tapped Hikaru's result card, which had been placed face down on her desk. "So, how about your results? Did you move up to level 3 yet?"

"I don't know." Hikaru sighed. "I must have slept through when they handed these out."

"You know, for such a smart student, you do sleep through an awfully large number of classes." Sayaka said teasingly.

"You have that backwards, actually. It's because I'm such a smart student that I can afford to sleep through so many classes and still do well." Hikaru flipped over the card, reading it briefly. "Nope. Still level 2." she flipped the card over and laid her head down again. "We should celebrate your achievement." she murmured through her arms. "Not every day that you get magical powers, after all."

"It's not magic." Sayaka said. "It's science. I would have thought you would be the first to defend that."

"Are you kidding me?" Hikaru said, laughing. "Okay, first off, have you read any of Schrodinger's actual work on quantum mechanics? The set of thought experiments that he conducted that supposedly provide 'scientific backing' for our esper abilities were actually created as an illustration of the ludicrousness of some of the affirmations made in the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, specifically on superposition states. It's true that some of his equations have later been found to apply to some of the phenomenon related to esper abilities, but they never predicted any of it. The closest thing to the common understanding of how our abilities work is actually the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, which was formulated by Everett, not Schrodinger. And even there, it's not a matter of the theory predicting an outcome, but more that parts of the outcome we see can be shown to not be impossible under the theory. If they quote the wrong scientist's work as evidence for the backing of our abilities, it's a pretty good indication that they don't actually know what they're talking about. I'm sure there _is_ a scientific explanation for it, but we are centuries away from figuring out what that explanation really is. So, yes, it's magic. After all, all magic is simply physics that we don't understand yet, and we certainly don't understand this."

"You lost me around 'Copenhagen interpretation'." Sayaka said, staring at Hikaru blankly.

"Whatever." Hikaru sighed, shaking her head. "Us. Party. Today. Did that at least get through?"

"Did someone say party?" A boy called from a few desks over, turning to face the two girls. "I do hope you weren't planning on doing something fun without me."

"Oh, of course not." Hikaru said mockingly. "How could we possibly do anything without you?"

"Kazuki!" Sayaka said, rushing over to his desk. "Oh, you're not going to believe this!"

Hikaru put her head back down on her desk, letting herself settle into a comfortable position with her head snug in her arms. There was still a final block to sleep through, after all. She might as well get started.

-:(&):-

"How do you know about this place?" Sayaka asked, looking up with apprehension at the large, somewhat dilapidated building with a flickering neon sign signifying that the establishment was open for business.

"I explore." Hikaru said. "Is it really that important?"

"I mean, we are sort of in the middle of nowhere." Sayaka said. "Or, as much of the 'middle of nowhere' as you can get in Academy City, anyway." she looked around nervously. "Are you sure we should be here?"

"We're ten years old, Sayaka." Hikaru said patently. "No one is going to be interested in 'taking advantage' of us, and we're too young to be carrying any significant amount of money. We're going to be fine."

"If you're sure." Sayaka said.

"Oh, we'll be fine." Kazuki said. "And if something goes wrong, I'll be here to defend you two."

"Right." Hikaru said mockingly. "I'm sure the ten-year-old, no combat training, low mass, level 0 boy is going to be more than capable of defending the helpless girls in his party."

"Hmph." he huffed, pushing his slightly too large glasses back up onto the bridge of his nose. "Just you wait. I'll catch up to you two soon enough."

"And when you do, we'll celebrate for you." Hikaru said sweetly. "Like we're supposed to be doing for Sayaka. Right now. If both of you would just swallow your misconceptions and step inside the building with me. That would be great."

"Fine, fine." Kazuki said.

"This better be pretty good, Hikaru." Sayaka grumbled, walking in after Kazuki. Hikaru sighed, stepping in after them. She wished her friends would give her a little bit of the benefit of the doubt.

Sayaka and Kazuki gasped, and Hikaru let herself assume a smug smile. "Told you." she muttered, the three emerging into a bustling arcade area. They were surrounded in flashing lights, colorful displays, and the chirping and twittering of 8-bit sound effects.

"How do you know about this place?" Sayaka said in wonder, looking around the wide open floor, examining the gaming cabinets with a somewhat feverish look.

"I explore." Hikaru repeated. "As far as I know, this is the last surviving gaming arcade done in the style of the 1980's in Academy City. I know how much you enjoy retro gaming platforms, so I kept this under wraps for a special occasion."

"Uh huh." Sayaka said, not really paying attention. "Where can I get tokens for the games?"

Hikaru pointed, and Sayaka wandered off without a second of hesitation. After pausing long enough to make sure she found her place, Hikaru turned to Kazuki. "Sorry that there isn't much else to do. I know you're not really into games, let alone 35+ year old games, but try to enjoy yourself for Sayaka's sake, okay?"

"You did good." he said. "She's happy. That's the important part."

"How surprisingly selfless and insightful of a thing to say, Kazuki." Hikaru said teasingly, nudging him. "If you keep this up for too long, I'll start to get suspicious."

"Sorry." he said. "I'll try to be more boorish for you, Hikaru." Hikaru grinned, and he smiled back at her. "Is there any food we could get?"

"There's some disturbingly greasy snacks and soda for sale over there." Hikaru said, pointing to a booth with a menu sign hanging over it. "It tastes great, but, uh, make sure you only eat about half as much as you think you want or it'll end up coming back to get you."

"Understood." he said. "Do you want anything?"

"No. I'll be fine." Hikaru said, pulling a notebook out of her backpack and clicking a pen into action. "I'll be catching up on a little bit of my work over on the benches."

"Right." Kazuki said, walking away. Hikaru made her way to the benches in the corner of the room, settling down in a comfortable position, placing her textbook on her lap and keeping her notebook at the ready to record any observations.

"What are you studying now?" Kazuki asked, sitting down next to Hikaru a few minutes later, a large number of not quite identifiable fried objects now in his possession. Hikaru looked up briefly, then turned back to her book.

"Linguistic Anthropology, by Alessandro Duranti." she said, taking note of some important topic heading and jotting down a few connections in her notebook. "I'd be lying if I said that it was the most interesting thing I'd read, but it has its moments. I've previously read some of Chomsky's work, and I thought it would be a good idea to get a bit of a balance of views, see what the other camp of linguists came up with. I have to say, Chomsky's concept of universal grammar is certainly more elegant and beautiful then this interdisciplinary approach, but Duranti does make some good points."

"Uh huh." Kazuki said. "Where do you even get these textbooks, Hikaru?"

"The internet is a beautiful thing." Hikaru replied. "As it turns out, you don't need to be a university student to get most university textbooks; you just have to know where to buy them."

"Wait, hold on." he said, peering over her shoulder. "That textbook is written in English. How are you even reading that?"

"I'm fluent in three languages and can read seven." Hikaru said. "I thought you knew this."

"Being able to 'read' seven languages is different than being able to read university textbooks in seven languages." Kazuki said, shaking his head and beginning to eat some of the food he'd bought. "Really, at this point I shouldn't be surprised. Though, why, uh, linguistic anthro-whatnow? I'd have thought you'd be doing some math or physics or something like that."

"In Academy City, we're given very advanced math and science curriculum, but at the cost of the liberal arts. I'm just making up for the gaps." Hikaru said. "I don't have much interest in the physical sciences, I don't want to be a researcher or engineer, and pure mathematics never seemed like it had much point to it. Language studies, literature studies, art theory, and philosophy have always been more interesting to me."

"A good scientific basis is the key to unlocking esper abilities." Kazuki said. "Sure you don't want to use that brain of yours to level up a few times first?"

"I've already completed most of the high school science curriculum offered here." Hikaru said dismissively. "After performing some tests, it became clear that I was making no significant improvements in my skills above the baseline. Actually, if anything, there was a slight negative correlation between the time I spent studying science and my rate of improvement."

"How did you convince them to let you go ahead? They don't usually let people take instruction out of order." he said.

"I didn't. But the high school students didn't mind lending me their textbooks if I did their homework for them." Hikaru said. "No obstacle is insurmountable, if you're willing to put in the effort to discover a creative solution."

"Right." he sighed. "I forgot who I was speaking to. I honestly think that I get smarter through just having to interact with you regularly."

"You've certainly picked up some vocabulary." Hikaru said. "We're just about the most articulate ten year olds you can find, and that definitely comes from me. The rest of it, though, is just you realizing that you secretly were smarter to begin with, but too shy to assert that fact."

"If you say so. You're probably right." Kazuki said. "You know, Hikaru, what's it like to know everything?"

"I couldn't tell you, though I'd imagine that it would be quite boring." Hikaru replied.

The two sat in silence after that, Hikaru flipping through her textbook and Kazuki eating his food. She made good progress through the text, carefully denoting interesting passages and topics for more in-depth study. She got so lost in it that it wasn't until she was being shaken that she snapped out enough to look around.

"Hikaru!" Kazuki said, and she jolted to attention. He looked worried. "I can't find Sayaka. I don't think she's in the building anymore."

"What?" Hikaru said, shocked. "What could have happened?"

"I don't know, but when I went to find her, she wasn't anywhere. The building isn't big enough for me to have missed her. She's not here anymore." Kazuki said.

"Where did you see her last?" Hikaru asked, scanning the room for any clues. "And how long ago did you notice?"

"I've been looking for her for at least five minutes, but she's probably been gone longer than that." Kazuki said.

"Uh, how long was I reading for?" Hikaru asked.

"It's only been twenty minutes." Kazuki reassured her. "She's not hours gone."

Hikaru sighed in relief, then stood up. "I'm going to see if I can pick up any clues around here.  
You ask around if people have seen her. She'd have been excitable enough to draw attention to herself."

"I already have. No one remembered her except for the token clerk, and he didn't pay attention to her after he got his money." Kazuki said. "I wouldn't have gotten you if she had stepped outside or was in the bathroom. I've already been looking."

"I wish you hadn't. This is a very bad sign." Hikaru said. "I'd much rather it just be you getting freaked out over nothing."

"So do I." Kazuki said. "But I think she's really disappeared."

"Okay. Um, see if you can figure out who's been in and out of the building and when." Hikaru said. "The door has a buzzer so that the clerk can get the tokens ready. If we're lucky, there will be an electronic log of times the door's been opened. We might be able to figure out when exactly she left from that." Hikaru drew up the mental list of the games that Sayaka enjoyed, spotting one of the cabinets. "I'm going to see if there's any information we can get from where she's been. I don't expect anything… she was in the building for fifteen minutes at most, so there's not going to be much evidence left behind. Still, I'll check. If anyone can put together context clues, it's me."

"Meet at the door in three minutes?" he asked, and Hikaru nodded. He headed off to the token booth, while Hikaru began to examine the gaming cabinets that Sayaka would have been likely to stop at. With such a short timeframe, she likely only got through three or four games; she might have only visited one cabinet. Picking the target closest to the door, Hikaru checked the cabinet over. She couldn't care less what the game was, but it flashed visuals distractingly at her and she found it hard to ignore. There wasn't any signs of use or any clues, not that she had expected there to be any.

She was about to leave when the screen flashed to the scoreboard. There was an all-time board, as well as a daily one. 'SAY' held the top three slots on the daily scores; she appeared to be the only one to have played this cabinet today. The top two scores were both above 200,000; Hikaru had no idea if that was good or not. The third score, however, was down below 50,000, and the timestamp recorded it as being the third game played. Hikaru felt a little worry flutter in her chest. The only reason that the score would drop like that was either that she had become extremely distracted by something… or she had been removed from the cabinet before she could finish a game. Neither boded well. At the very least, it suggested that Sayaka's removal from the building was not by her choice.

Hikaru gave the cabinet a final search, then left to wait for Kazuki's return. He appeared shortly thereafter with a short list in his hand.

"As it turns out, they don't usually give the entrance lists to people. Unsurprising, but annoying." Kazuki said.

"Any around 17:03?" Hikaru asked.

"Uh, two actually. We have a 17:03:43 and then a 17:03:50." he frowned. "There's barely enough time between those for the door to have closed fully."

"The last game of hers I could find was timestamped with 17:03." Hikaru said. "I think it's safe to assume that the 17:03 exit was hers." Hikaru sighed. "And, you're really not going to like this, but it looks like it was not by choice. She appears to have abandoned her game in the middle of a round. Something external caused her to leave."

"She was taken?" he asked, incredulous.

"Not necessarily. She could have seen something or someone that convinced her that she needed to leave. Or maybe she saw something great and decided to follow it out. We have very little to go on." Hikaru checked her watch. "It's 17:12 now, so we're only nine minutes behind her." she looked around. "But I haven't the faintest clue as to where she could have gone."

"Wait, hold on." Kazuki took out a cellphone and dialed quickly. "It's ringing, but she's not picking up." he said after a pause. "So she can't access her cellphone, whatever she's doing."

"Don't hang up." Hikaru said, extending her hand. "Give me that phone." Kazuki did so, and Hikaru listened in carefully, concentrating. "She's moving." she said after a moment. "Somewhere between 65 and 80 kph. I can tell because of the slight fade out as the signal switches active towers. I have no idea where she is, but she's in a vehicle."

"So she has been kidnaped." Kazuki said.

"Shh!" Hikaru said. "I'm going to try to see if I can figure out when they stop moving."  
"We should call judgment, or, at this point, Anti-Skill." Kazuki said. "This is way bigger than us."

"She's a level 1 girl with no social connections, Kazuki. Unless she's been kidnaped by some big name organization or individuals, they have much bigger things to be dealing with. No one is going to come to help us." Hikaru said. "If it'll make you feel better, go ahead and report it, but they're not going to move nearly fast enough if she's really in danger."

"What's your plan, then?" Kazuki asked. "Neither of us have any ability to take on even adult level 0's, and we have no idea where she is."

"I'll… think of something." Hikaru said. "We can't just leave her." she looked down. "I got her into this. You two were right, we shouldn't have come out to this place. We would have been safer closer to the business sector."

"This isn't your fault." Kazuki said. "And you can't let that guilt make you do something stupid."

"I know, but…" Hikaru paused, then handed the phone back to Kazuki. "They've stopped." she paused again. "Do you have an image sending app?"

"Uh, yeah." he said. Hikaru took out her phone, switching around until she'd entered hers.

"I'm going to send you an image. I want you to go to your phone's settings and change your home tower to tower 17, and then set the phone to only route through that tower. Then, send the image I send you to Sayaka and tell me how long it takes between when you send the image and you receive the 'image received' message." Hikaru instructed. Kazuki's phone beeped, and he went about following Hikaru's instructions. About a minute later, he turned to her.

"About five seconds from when I sent it to when I got the 'image received' message." he said.

"Okay. I routed through tower 12, and it took seven seconds. That means that the distance between her and tower 17 must be less than her distance from tower 12, as both towers are the same distance from us." Hikaru paused. "Hold on." Kazuki's phone beeped again, and Hikaru nodded. "Round trip from tower 12 is four seconds, so it must be two each way. Rate of data transfer decreases roughly linearly by distance, and the time the return packet would take is tiny in comparison to the image file, so she must be roughly 1.5 times farther from tower 17 than we are, and roughly 2.5 times farther from tower 12. Those two circles won't have much overlap. If I can get a map…" she opened a map program, plotting some points. "I've figured out where she is, give or take 100 meters. Quite a bit of error in the calculation, but we have an area."

"Okay. Hikaru, we really should just tell someone now." Kazuki said. "Not many kidnappings get reported within 15 minutes and pointed to a 100 meter radius. The authorities can take care of it from here. The only reason they can't step in immediately for things like this is that they don't know where to go. If you've got a location, we really should just leave it to them."

"Are you going to trust them to help Sayaka? She's your friend too." Hikaru accused.

"Are you sure your general distrust of the establishment isn't clouding your view?" Kazuki said. "Hikaru, just about anyone in the world would be better able to do this than a ten year old girl who's never even been in combat before."

"I can't take the chance." Hikaru said. "Look, you don't need to come with me."

"I'm not letting you go alone." Kazuki said. "But I'm also going to call Anti-Skill. That way, if they really are slower than some ten year old with a death wish, we'll get their first anyway, and when we get ourselves in trouble, which we will, they'll show up and rescue us."

"If it makes you feel better." Hikaru said. "We're thirteen minutes behind her now, and she's a good half-hour's walk away. We don't have time to lose."

Hikaru left the building quickly, Kazuki talking into his phone and following behind her. She felt a rush in her blood. This was what an adventure was like. She almost found herself smiling, but she forced the childlike glee down. This was a dangerous situation. Despite everything, it was true that she'd never actually done anything like this before. And no matter how well she thought she could do, putting that into practice would be another story altogether. Real life was never as clean as you wanted it to be, and there would always be unforeseen variables. Still, none of that changed the fact that Sayaka was in danger. She needed to do this.

They crossed from street to street, making good progress through the city. Minutes dragged on by as they slowly drew in on their target. As time passed, Hikaru began to feel increasingly unsettled. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. After all, she was a ten year old, taking on a group of unknown size and ability, with no experience. Perhaps she'd let the heroic ideal get a little too ingrained in her thoughts. And she was dragging Kazuki along too; as bad as her chances were, his were even worse.

Twenty minutes in, she stopped. Kazuki caught up to her, looking worried. "Is this it?" he asked.

"No." Hikaru said. "I think… maybe… you're right. I've been thinking about it, and this really is over our heads. We can't do anything here. We should leave this to the experts." She looked down. "I was just scared and wanted to help. I feel useless just sitting back and letting other people try to fix the problem when it's my friend in trouble."

"So do I." Kazuki said. "But if we just get ourselves hurt in the process of trying to feel useful, we're going to make things worse."

"Too late for that, I'm afraid." A gruff voice said from behind them, and Hikaru didn't quite have enough time to turn around before she felt a sharp pain on her neck, and everything went dark.

-:(&):-

"Hikaru!" Hikaru blinked blearily, the world around her dark. "Hikaru, are you alright?"

"Sayaka…" Hikaru said dazedly, then shook her head. "Sayaka!" she tried to make out the other girl's face, but she couldn't see anything. A throbbing pain shot through her head, and Hikaru moaned loudly.

"Hikaru!" she felt her body being pulled into a hug, and smelled Sayaka's ghostly mint shampoo mixed with humid, sweaty fear. "You're okay. I've been so worried! You haven't moved in at least an hour."

"Where are we?" Hikaru said. "And where is Kazuki?"

"Here." Kazuki called in the darkness. "I woke up about ten minutes ago. Sayaka says that they've thrown us in some kind of old storage locker. We're trapped in here."

"Hold on." Hikaru said, concentrating for a moment. In the palm of her hand, a small glowing blue orb flickered to life, and she strengthened it until the room was well lit with the sapphire glow. The room was small, though not tiny, maybe four meters to a side. Sayaka and Kazuki looked scared, and Kazuki appeared to be bleeding, though not significantly and not from any worrying locations. Hikaru touched the back of her head, wincing in pain from the contact. Drawing her hand back, she was relieved to find that she was not bleeding. It appeared that, while certainly not happy, the three of them weren't in any immediate danger. Her backpack had been taken away from her, though it appeared that she had been left her watch. One of the lenses of Kazuki's glasses had shattered, and he was now squinting to see through his single lens. "That should be better."

"Let there be light." Kazuki said. "Thanks, Hikaru."

"Do you know why we're here?" Hikaru asked, and Sayaka shook her head.

"I told one of them that I'd just made it to level 1, and they got really scary and tried to grab me. I tried to exit the building, but then I saw a few more guys standing outside waiting. I tried to go back in to alert you two, but the first man grabbed me just as I got the door open and dragged me outside." Sayaka said. "I don't know what they're after."

Hikaru checked her watch. "23:19!" she said, shocked. "We've been out way more than one hour. More like five and a half."

"Five and a half hours?" Kazuki said.

"Yeah. And six since you called Anti-Skill." Hikaru said.

"Now is really not the time for an 'I told you so'." Kazuki said.

"Believe me, you have no idea how much I wish I'd been wrong." Hikaru said. She looked up, seeing the other's expectant faces looking back at her. "What?" she asked.

"Well…" Kazuki said. "I believe it was said that no obstacle is insurmountable if you're willing to put in the effort to discover a creative solution."

"It's a locked steel box. We have no tools, no weapons, and no information on what's going on. We're injured, tired, and unprepared." Sayaka said, grinning. "I don't know. Fifteen minutes?"

"This is Hikaru we're talking about." Kazuki said. "Ten."

"Oh, wow. No pressure, huh?" Hikaru said. She stood up, pressing her hands to the side of the door, letting her light float behind her. She carefully felt the seam. "No airflow, so either the pressure is equalized, or the door's sealed very tightly. It looks like the locking mechanism is on the outside only, though the bolts are on our side." she cast her gaze around the room. "Two air vents on the ceiling, which explains why we haven't asphyxiated yet. They're a bit too small to be useful, though. No electrical equipment, which is good, because it means they're not monitoring us, though it does limit our options slightly…" Hikaru paused, thinking. "Did they leave any of you with a cellphone?"

"No." Sayaka said.

"Wait, I think they've…" Kazuki started, then sighed. "I still have it, but it's very broken. I can see some of the wires." he paused. "Oh, and it looks like I have one of those little plastic prize containers that you get from those coin machines. If that helps."

"Okay. So, we have a broken cellphone, a broken pair of glasses with one working lens, a watch, a small clear plastic container, our clothes, our bodies, and the ability to generate blue light." Hikaru paused. "Actually, Sayaka, what is your esper power?"

"Nucleosynthesis." Sayaka said, and Hikaru coughed in surprise.

"What!?" Hikaru exclaimed. "Sayaka, that's ridiculous. You…"

"What is Nucleosynthesis?" Kazuki asked. "Is that good or bad?"

"Good. Very good." Hikaru said. "That's the ability to turn one element into another. Lead into gold, that sort of thing. Only two espers in the whole city can manage it; I suppose Sayaka makes three."

"I can only go up in the table, not down. So, actually, I could only do gold into lead." Sayaka said. "And I can only increment by one element at a time right now, and only in very small amounts. I am only just barely level 1, after all."

"Okay, less immediately useful." Hikaru said, backing off a little. "But still awesome." she paused. "And now I can get us out of here." she turned to Kazuki. "I need your glasses. Sayaka, stand by for instructions."

Kazuki handed her his glasses, and Hikaru approached the bolts. Moving her light to the right distance, she used the lens in the glasses to begin to heat the bolt. A few seconds past, and not much happened.

"Are you sure that's going to work? Can you really melt the metal?" Sayaka asked.

"With a better lens, I can make enough light to melt steel easy." Hikaru said. "This lens? No. But I can heat it to two or three hundred degrees, which is what I really need." she handed Sayaka the small plastic container. "Start converting the nitrogen in the container to oxygen. There isn't much in there at all, so it shouldn't take too long."

"Okay." Sayaka's brow furrowed, and she grunted lightly as she concentrated. About ten seconds later, she let out a deep breath. "Done."

"How much control do you have over the reactions?" Hikaru asked. "Will the chemicals mix when you're converting them?"

"I don't think so." Sayaka said. "Though it's very hard to keep them like that for any length of time."

"Can you manage it in that container for, say, thirty seconds?" Hikaru asked, and Sayaka nodded after a brief concerned pause. "Okay. Sayaka, I want you to very carefully change the oxygen into fluorine. As soon as you finish the conversion, tell me to duck out of the way and throw the container at the door. The hot metal should spontaneously catch fire in the fluorine gas, and if we're lucky it'll both melt the lock and use up the fluorine."

"Are you sure?" Sayaka said. "Um, I've never been much into chemistry, but isn't fluorine really, really bad?"

"Yes. That's exactly why we want it." Hikaru said. "Fluorine is awful. Steel burns in fluorine gas at room temperatures sometimes. Heat the metal to a few hundred degrees, and it'll burst into a fireball instantly. Which is exactly what we want."

"This seems like a really bad idea." Kazuki said nervously. "Fireballs in an enclosed space are never a good idea. Not to mention the chance of the fluorine gas getting back on us. If it can melt steel beams, I'd hate to see what it does to skin."

"We have really, really limited options." Hikaru said. She paused for a moment, thinking. "But, uh, yeah, maybe I was letting theory get a little bit ahead of practicality there. I'll try to think of something else first."

"Um, I've already started making the fluorine." Sayaka said, and Hikaru felt her heart sink.

"Okay. Uh, just stop where you are." Hikaru said. "Um. Can you forward that to neon?"

"I'm getting really, really tired." Sayaka said. "I don't think so."

"How long until you lose control?" Hikaru asked.

"Ten seconds." Sayaka said.

"Okay, back to the original plan." Hikaru said. "Everyone take a deep breath, then throw it at the door as hard as you can!"

Hikaru drew in a breath and dropped to the floor. There was a terrible explosive rush of heat, and then silence. Shakily, Hikaru turned her light back on. The metal bar had, it appeared, been partly melted by the heat of the reaction, so at least they had made progress. The others looked unhurt, though Sayaka looked stunned like she didn't quite believe what had happened.

"Pure oxygen and fluorine pack quite a punch." Hikaru said, though it was barely audible over the ringing in her ears.

"Did I do that?" Sayaka asked slowly.

"Yes." Hikaru said, standing up slowly and walking over to Sayaka, putting her arm around the other girl's shoulders. "Congratulations. You know how to turn air into a very toxic high-explosive high-corrosive capsule now." Hikaru sighed. "We're just lucky we were dealing with such a small amount, only a few micrograms. Really, that was a very dumb idea. I don't know what I was thinking."

"Well, it does look like it worked." Kazuki said, pressing on the door. It stuck a little, the yellow hot metal bending slightly before giving with a wrench. "So that's a plus."

"Before we go, we need to come up with a plan." Hikaru said. "Sayaka, you were conscious when they dragged you in here, right? Did you get any look at the floorplan? Do you remember the way out?"

"No, not really." Sayaka said. The exhaustion was clear in her voice, and she looked like she was barely standing up at this point. Hikaru's heart sank. It looked like Sayaka's new power was very, very taxing.

"Can you still run?" Hikaru asked, concerned. "Or do you need to sit down?"

"We just let off an explosion, Hikaru." Kazuki said. "They might not have been monitoring us, but they certainly know we're up to something now."

"Right." Hikaru said. "Remind me never to get caught in a dire situation without you, Kazuki. For all my knowledge and intelligence, you seem to be the only one with common sense." she paused. "Do you need help, Sayaka? Because we really need to go, right now."

"I can still run." Sayaka said, determination crossing her eyes and filling her tired form.

"Okay, we just break for it on three. If we don't know the floorplan, any direction is as good as the other – so just head straight, and turn left if there's no door leading straight. Any dead ends, back out and try any other exit. Hopefully the building isn't that big." Hikaru said. The others nodded, scared but still determined to make it out. "One…" Hikaru steeled herself, ready for the dash. "Two…" the others leaned in on the door, preparing to push it open. "Three!" Hikaru yelled, and the three children threw themselves at the door.

It slipped about five centimeters before getting caught by the internal deadlock with a sickening clang.

Hikaru sat down, defeated. "Well, that's that." she said numbly. "There's an internal locking mechanism, a bolt inside of the doorframe. We'd have to cut half way through the solid steel door just to get to the bolt, and then we'd have to cut the bolt somehow. The lens is burnt out and wouldn't have worked anyway, Sayaka is running on empty, and there isn't anything I can really do with a broken cellphone. I think we're stuck, at least for the time being."

"We can't give up." Kazuki said. "Whatever these people have planned for us, it can't possibly be good. We need to get out of here."

"I know, I know." Hikaru said. "But I can't think of anything."

It was at that moment that a defining clang rang out, and the door began to slide open. Hikaru summoned one of her orbs of light, keeping it steady. As poor of a weapon as it might be, she could theoretically blind someone with the light if she was lucky. It was really her only shot. "Cover your eyes!" Hikaru shouted to the other two, then flared her power as hard as she could as soon as the door opened enough to see past.

It was more powerful then she'd expected, enough to warm her hand uncomfortably and blind her through her closed eyelids. She could see the shadows cast by the objects through her closed eyes, ghostly imprints of their shapes burnt on her retina.

"Fuck!" one of the people yelled, clutching the side of the door. "I think that blinded me through my visor!"

"Suck it up." another said. "You'll be fine. Those visors are rated to work against light-based powers, so there's no way the girl's done more than stun you." Hikaru couldn't see the person very well, her vision still blotchy and blurry from her flash. They took a step closer to her, and Hikaru tried to backstep away.

"Hey, no need to be frightened." The man said. "We're Anti-Skill. Someone called in to tip us off to a potential kidnapping, and we've come to get you three out of here." he paused. "We'd appreciate it if you'd stop trying to blind us.

Hikaru noticed that she'd keep the light on, not nearly as bright as the flash but certainly difficult to look at. She sheepishly turned it off. "Sorry."

"Setting an ambush for your captors. Ten, and already taking things into your own hands." the uniformed man said kindly. "Don't worry, we're not angry with you."

"Speak for yourself." the other one grumbled. The first one elbowed him.

"Come on." The uniformed man said, reaching down and helping Hikaru to her feet. "Let's get you home."

Hikaru, Sayaka, and Kazuki let themselves be led out of the building by the Anti-Skill officers. Any sign of the group that had attacked them had disappeared, leaving only an empty building and some abandoned equipment.

"Third time this month that Skill-Out's done kidnapping." one of the officers said, quiet enough that it was obvious that they didn't intend on others hearing but not nearly quiet enough for Hikaru to have to strain to hear.

"They're going after little kids level 1 and 2 now. It's not a good sign." another officer agreed. "We've had no deaths yet, but it's only a matter of time."

"Shh, not in front of the kids, idiot." another hissed at them.

Hikaru, for her part, was only partly listening. Her mind kept playing the events of the last few hours back in her head. Things had turned out okay, she guessed, but it was only through luck. As bad as things had gone, a lot had also gone inexplicably right. If any of their lucky streaks had turned, even for a moment, that would have been that. Had they stayed unconscious for slightly less time, their escape attempt would have signaled their captors. A little longer, and the Anti-Skill officers would have passed them by, unalerted to their presence. A small plastic capsule that should have been trash, a pair of glasses that should have been smashed, and an insane plan hatched in desperation by a girl genius with no real experience had all, by some impossible stroke of fortune, lined up for them. They shouldn't have succeeded. That was blatantly clear to Hikaru. It was like a scenario from a story; all the pieces technically fit together, but there was no way that all the events required could ever reasonably be expected to go off just so in real life. And even still, they hadn't really succeeded. If Anti-Skill hadn't been on the other side of that door… there would have been nothing she could have done.

She had to have more options. Suddenly, the possibilities of danger had become a reality. It was no longer the realm of thought experiments, but that of practical application. She lived in a world where the ability to defend oneself was required on a regular basis by a not insignificant fraction of the population. Until today, it hadn't been her. Now, it seemed, it was. Once trouble found you once, it had a habit of showing up again. And she wouldn't sit around and just let life happen to her, not if she had the ability to foreplan.

 _I need a weapon._ Hikaru thought. _And I need it soon._

 **Author's Note:** Unless specifically mentioned as otherwise, please just assume that the correct honorifics are being used. It makes things easier for me, and eliminates the possibility of the many, many mistakes that I would make otherwise.


	2. Optics 1-1

Optics 1.1

 _-Twelve days later-_

"Whatcha doing?" Sayaka said, grinning down at Hikaru. Hikaru sighed, putting down her pencil and looking up from her sketchbook.

"Just finishing some notes on a project." Hikaru said. "Nothing that interesting."

"Oooh, being secretive?" Sayaka said, trying to get a glimpse of Hikaru's drawings. "Now I'm more interested."

"It's really nothing." Hikaru said. "Just some casing specifications, see?" she showed Sayaka the complex diagrams, and watched the confusion spread through the other girls eyes as she tried to make sense of Hikaru's dense technical work.

"Oh. Well, good luck with that then." Sayaka said, obviously unable to comprehend exactly what Hikaru was doing. Which, Hikaru supposed, was a good thing. Sayaka shook her head, then took Hikaru's hands in hers and dragged her to her feet. "Come on!" she said.

Hikaru blinked in confusion. "Where are we going?" she asked.

"To adventure!" Sayaka said, and Hikaru winced. Their experience less than a fortnight ago had had very different effects on the three friends. Kazuki had become more quiet, and had started to spend less time in the company of the two girls. Hikaru had begun to make her own preparations for future defense, preparations which were now nearing completion. Sayaka, however, had seemingly been excited by the experience, and if anything had become more outgoing and bold as a result.

"Sayaka, really, is now the time?" Hikaru asked.

"You said what you were doing wasn't very interesting." Sayaka accused. "Come on! It's Sunday. We should be having fun!"

"Do you have a plan?" Hikaru asked, shaking her head.

"Nope!" Sayaka grinned. "Let's explore!"

"Sayaka, the last time we stepped outside of our comfort zone, nothing good came of it." Hikaru said. "Maybe there's a good reason 'the road more traveled by' is the one more traveled."  
"You came for me, right?" Sayaka said.

"Yes, of course I did." Hikaru said.

"And you're telling me that you weren't just a little bit excited at the idea of the rescue?" Sayaka asked.

"Of course I was. I'd never done it before, and adventurous heroics have a huge cultural influence." Hikaru said. "And now that I have done it, I never want to have to again, if at all possible. It wasn't nearly as exciting as the stories make it out to be. It hurt, and I felt helpless, lost, and afraid for most of the time."

"I thought you were amazing." Sayaka said. "Such quick thinking. Kazuki told me about that data-time triangulation thing you did too. And you seemed so calm and ready, taking charge of the situation without pause."

"Most of that was luck." Hikaru dismissed. "And someone needed to step up."

"I…" Sayaka paused. "Maybe like isn't the right word, but it excited me. I wouldn't mind getting caught up in more things like that."

"You weren't knocked unconscious." Hikaru said.

"Yeah, I guess." Sayaka said. "Well, it's not like I'm going to go looking for it. Still, I feel restless. I want to try new things, be a little bolder than before, stray farther afield."

"I want to be ready if trouble comes my way, but I have no interest chasing it." Hikaru said. "I won't allow myself to meekly be pushed along by the whims of others, but if they leave me be I'm not going to go looking for them to confront."

"Well, it's not like we're going to run into too much trouble exploring the business districts." Sayaka said. "Come on, Hikaru, follow me into the well-charted personal unknown! Boundaries must be pushed! Horizons seen over!"

Hikaru sighed. "Fine. If you'd said that you meant to explore the business districts sooner, I'd have agreed."

"Baby steps first, but we have to start taking them." Sayaka said.

Hikaru closed her sketchbook, standing up and following Sayaka out and into the wider city. She knew she should stop being so paranoid. The world wasn't appreciably more dangerous than it had been two weeks ago, and it was very unlikely that anything would actually happen to them. Still, somehow the world felt much more hostile to Hikaru, and she found herself carefully scanning her surroundings as they walked through the streets. Sayaka seemed happy, enjoying seeing the new places. Really, it was strange that they hadn't been here before, being as it was only a few kilometers from their dorms. Hikaru supposed they were still a bit young, really, and used to being largely directed by external forces. Now was as good a time as any to begin expanding their boundaries, she supposed.

They stopped by a set of benches overlooking a small park-like area. Sayaka took out two little metal balls, playing with them idly as she sat. Hikaru examined the people around them, eventually sighing and letting go of her suspicions. There were even two members of Judgement sitting at a table of four nearby. She really should just let herself relax. The whole world wasn't out to get her. Most of the world wasn't even aware she existed yet.

"What are those?" Hikaru asked Sayaka. She had a sinking suspicion that she knew, and she wasn't happy about it.

"Neodymium magnets." Sayaka said, and Hikaru felt her heart flutter.

"Sayaka, please tell me you got that as a finger toy." Hikaru said.

"I mean, sort of, but I've got to get some practice in." Sayaka said, and Hikaru's eyes went wide. "At this point, they're about 95% Neodymium and 5% Samarium. Just 18 steps until platinum. They'll be worth 300,000 ¥ in eight months when I finish the conversion at this rate. Not bad for an 800 ¥ purchase, and it'll be good training." She paused. "A bit annoying to handle with Promethium being radioactive and all, but that just gives me even more incentive to make sure I convert all the way through immediately."

Hikaru sighed in relief, her body relaxing again. "Oh, god, Sayaka, don't you dare scare me like that again. I thought you'd been walking around with a few grams of Promethium in your pocket. I'm glad I don't have to throw a goodbye party."

"Hey, after seeing that fluorine demonstration, I did some research into the elements. I don't want to poison, burn, or irradiate myself on accident." Sayaka said. "Still, I have to practice my power. I'm still only converting a few micrograms a second, but I can keep it up for more than three minutes now, twice what it was two weeks ago. And that's just twelve days of training."

"No need to rush it." Hikaru said. "Though I'm glad you're not going into this blind."

"I figure that if I have any big problems, you'll be able to solve them." Sayaka said. "And I'm not rushing, but we should get started. We only have one life, and we should make the most of it!" Sayaka stood up on the bench, grinning down at Hikaru. "We're ten, almost eleven years old. It's time to make this our city!"

"Sayaka, don't you think you're getting a little ahead of yourself?" Hikaru asked nervously. "We're still really young. Maybe we should wait a few years and a few esper levels before making this 'our city'."

"Aren't one of the level 5's a fourteen year old girl?" Sayaka said. "That's only three and change years ahead of us. I bet she gets up to all kinds of cool stuff." there was a coughing noise from the table nearby, though Hikaru didn't pay it much mind.

"Three and change years is nearly a third of our lives so far." Hikaru pointed out. "A lot can change in that time. Besides, the Railgun's far and away more powerful than we'll ever be. She can afford to be reckless and get into all sorts of things that we'd just get killed attempting. We're simply not qualified to be heroes in this world. The bar is a bit above our heads mentally, emotionally, and power-wise."

"Don't sell yourself so short, kid." a voice said from behind them, and Hikaru turned to face four girls, ranging from perhaps two to four years older than Sayaka and herself. She recognized them as the group of four that the Judgement girls had been sitting with. The oldest of the girls, perhaps fourteen with brown hair and brown eyes, turned to Sayaka. "And you shouldn't listen to someone who tells you what you can't do." she paused. "Sorry, I just couldn't help but overhear your conversation."

"Unsurprising, given how loud we were." Hikaru said. "Sorry if we bothered you."

The girl gave Hikaru a brief look. "Oh, I don't mind." she said, then turned back to Sayaka. "What can you do?"

"Nucleosynthesis." Sayaka said. "Turning one element into another."

"Like lead into gold?" one of the other girls, slightly younger with long black hair, asked. "That sounds awesome."

"I'm really bad at it." Sayaka said. "I can only transmute about a gram of material total before I exhaust myself."

"You said that you were going to make this 'your city.'" the brown haired girl said. "Did you mean that?"

"Of course!" Sayaka affirmed.

"Then push your limits. Don't give up when you think you can't go any farther. That's the time you have to push harder, to take the next step no matter what." the brown haired girl said. "The way to make it to the top is simply the art of going just a little farther than anyone else expects you to." she ruffled Sayaka's hair. "Someone who never quits can't ever be stopped."

"Oh, Onee-sama! So inspiring!" one of the shorter girls with a strange shade of nearly pink hair said, leaning on the brown haired one. Hikaru felt like she should know who these girls were, though the names escaped her.

"And what about you?" Hikaru looked up, slightly surprised that the girl would address her.

"Me?" Hikaru responded.

"Yeah. What do you want?" she asked.

Hikaru paused, thinking. What did she want? What was she really after? She looked briefly at the older girl. The answer needed to be true, though the structures of polite conversation required her to come up with a response quickly. She gave herself the liberty of a few moments of thought before she turned up, locking eyes with the girl, her steady, serious gaze demanding the older girl's full attention. "I want enough power to allow myself to always do what is right, to not have to live by the design of the plans of others." she said, her words clear and deliberate.

"Oh." the brown haired girl said. It was obvious that she hadn't expected a response like that, though she didn't seem too taken aback. Still, it appeared that she was temporarily at a loss for words.

"Well, that's easy." The girl with the long black hair said, stepping forward. "You already do."

Hikaru laughed softly, and the girl shook her head slowly. "You think that's a joke, but it's not."

the girl sighed. "There is no one, from the weakest level 0 to the strongest level 5, who achieves all they want without effort. Power can be useful in getting what you wish, but it is far from the only variable." she paused. "It's so easy to think, 'oh, if only I was more powerful, I'd be able to do what I wanted.' I've been there. More than once. But, really, that's just an excuse people use for bending under the pressure when it would be hard to stand against. Anyone can take the steps to make change, if they're willing to accept what they can accomplish rather than wish for what they can't." she poked Hikaru in the stomach lightly. "The only power you need to 'always do what is right' is the will to do exactly that, no matter how difficult it seems."

Hikaru felt her stomach tighten. Could she really afford to take that advice?

Could she really afford not to?

"If you really feel that way, maybe you should try out for Judgement." the fourth girl, the smallest of the group with short black hair and a ribbon of flowers crowning her head, addressed Hikaru. "We could always use more people who are there for the job rather than the status."

Hikaru blinked. She couldn't believe that she hadn't recognized the girl before, though to be fair they had never met in person. That phrasing coupled with that message, however, solidified the connection. She pushed past the brown haired girl, stepping up to the new one slowly. "Wait, Uiharu Kazari? Is that you?" she said, a little awe in her voice.

"Um, yes!" Uiharu said. "Do we know each other?"

"Vaguely." Hikaru said. "Exploit green-sigma-13."

Uiharu blushed red. "Oh! That was you? Really?" she said, a little excitement entering her tones. "Um, thank you for that. I suppose you would have seen my picture, wouldn't you?" she tittered slightly. "I can't believe Pulse is a ten year old." she paused. "I can't believe I'm talking to Pulse."

"I can't believe I'm talking to the Goalkeeper." Hikaru said. "What are the chances of us meeting like this!"

"You two know each other?" the pink haired girl asked.

"This girl is responsible for the only successful large scale cyberattack to effect Judgment servers in the last five years." Uiharu said. "That was about a year ago. You were only nine?"

"Nine and a half." Hikaru shrugged. "And, really, that was more luck than skill."

Hikaru felt her arms get drawn back, and she yelled out in discomfort.

"You're under arrest for hacking into Judgement servers." the pink haired girl said from behind her. "Uiharu, hand me some cuffs."

"Oh, no, don't do that!" Uiharu said. "She's one of the good guys."

"I'm strictly white-hat." Hikaru said, trying to stay calm. "I discovered a vulnerability in your system and let you know of it before someone else could do something actually damaging with it."

"You hacked Judgement and didn't tell me?" Sayaka said, stunned.

"I was very worried that I might get you in trouble." Hikaru said. She nodded at Uiharu. "She followed my callback and managed to bypass my signal rerouting. That was one laptop that I never managed to fix."

"Well, on the plus side, the data I got from you proved that you really were white-hat. Otherwise, we _would_ have arrested you." Uiharu said. "Sorry about the laptop, though."

"It was a year ago. I got over it." Hikaru said. "Besides, I was hacked by _Uiharu Kazari_. It was worth it to see you work."

"Um, if you wouldn't mind, I'd like to exchange notes with you." Uiharu said sheepishly.

"Are you kidding me?" Hikaru said. "I'd pay for the opportunity."

"What are you two on about?" the brown haired girl asked.

"She," Hikaru and Uiharu said simultaneously, "is the greatest white-hat hacker in Academy City."

"No, it's definitely you." Uiharu said. "I'm more of a defender."

"Are you kidding me?" Hikaru said. "I ride a far second to you. The poly-grid catastrophe? Four sisters challenge? Your work is legendary."

"Oh, that was just some lucky guesswork." Uiharu said, blushing again. "And you're simply a legend. Every hacker in the city knows Pulse."

"I did two big things. Sure, they were plenty big, but only two. Most of the stuff attributed to me was done by others who were inspired by my work. I'm really not that active." Hikaru said. "It's more of a hobby for me. You, you're solving problems and breaking new ground every other week, it seems." the two looked at each other with admiration clear in both of their faces.

"Are you two going to kiss?" the girl with the long black hair asked hopefully. "Because you look like you want to."

Uiharu and Hikaru both blushed brightly, and Hikaru started to glow lightly blue as her emotions flared. She tried to turn away, but noticed that the pink haired girl hadn't actually let go of her arms yet. She calmed down quickly, shaking her head.

"Would you mind letting me go?" Hikaru asked. The pink haired girl did so immediately, obviously having just forgotten to release her. Hikaru withdrew her cellphone as soon as her arms were free. "Hold on. I'm going to send you my contact information." she paused, scrolling through some data. "Also, why is your phone EMFP shielded?"

"Wait, you can EMFP shield phones?" the girl with the long black hair asked. "Can we do that to mine?"

"That was one time." the brown haired girl said exasperatedly.

"Twice, actually." the girl with the long black hair corrected. "And these things are expensive! I don't want to have to buy new ones, even if it's rare."

"I could use that too." the pink haired girl said.

"It won't work against direct electric strikes." Uiharu said. "I'm not sure how useful it would be for you, Shirai."

"Oh!" Hikaru said, snapping her fingers. A few things started clicking in her head. "Shirai Kuroko! That's right. Which makes you Misaka Mikoto, and you…" she paused, looking at the girl with long black hair. "I don't know who you are."

There was a brief pause. Misaka, Shirai, Uiharu, and the girl with the long black hair exchanged looks for a moment. Hikaru took this opportunity to hack into the final girl's phone, then clicked hers closed. "Okay. Saten Ruiko. Got it." she smiled at the four. "My name is Hikaru, and this is Hibiki Sayaka. It's a pleasure to meet you all!" she bowed lightly.

"I feel something has gone wrong, somehow." Misaka said.

"Usually they don't figure out your names if you don't introduce yourself, yes." Shirai said, mildly amused.

Hikaru turned back to Uiharu. "Did you get my information?" she asked.

"Um, yes." Uiharu said.

"Why don't you have a last name?" Saten asked suddenly. "Are you just Hikaru?"

"What is going on?" Sayaka said, shaking her head. "I think I lost track of the conversation."

"Plot relevant introductions." Hikaru said to Sayaka. "Don't worry about it." she turned to Saten. "And, to answer your question, I'm a child error, or, well, near enough. I don't really have a family name."

"How can someone be 'near enough' a child error?" Saten asked. "That seems like one of those things that you either are or are not."

"They found me when I was two years old. I had no identification except for the account number to a trust fund attached to a card around my neck. The account holds, or rather held, 25,000,000 ¥, enough to pay 10 years tuition to the city, automatically set to pay for my education. I am technically a child error, but I'm also technically attending Academy City as a full student." Hikaru paused. "At least, until the money runs out when I finish my first year of middle school in about 18 months. I don't know exactly what will happen at that point. The Academy City legal code is the one system that I've made no progress in understanding, no matter how hard I try."

"I suppose that would qualify." Saten agreed.

"Maybe I could apply to a university, get a research scholarship…" Hikaru mused, then shook her head. "My financial situation is not important."

"Oh, my, it's later than I thought." Uiharu said. "I think we should go." she smiled. "It was good to meet you, Pulse. I mean, Hikaru."

"Don't forget to contact me!" Hikaru said. The two ten year olds waved the group of four off before turning back to themselves. Sayaka sighed, sitting down on the bench again.

"Misaka Mikoto…" Sayaka said slowly. "I know I've heard that name before."

"Third strongest level 5 esper." Hikaru said, still reading through some of Uiharu's data. "You were talking about her, like, two seconds before she showed up. Actually, that might be why she showed up."

"What?!" Sayaka said. "That was the Railgun?"

"Yeah." Hikaru said. "Cool, huh?" she paused, sighing wistfully at her phone. "I hope Uiharu texts me back."

"You have some messed up priorities." Sayaka said.

"You don't understand. If you knew what she was capable of…" Hikaru sighed. "She's the goddess of computers."

"Uh huh. You fan-girled all over the person who can use computers well, and ignored the _third most powerful individual in the city._ " Sayaka said. "Why didn't you at least tell me?"

"I was unaware that you wanted to meet her. I would have if I'd known." Hikaru said. "Actually, miss 'push our boundaries', she's only maybe thirty meters away. You can still catch up to them if you run. Why don't you go and talk to her? She seemed fairly approachable."

"But…" Sayaka said, looking down. "She's, like…"

"About forty meters away now. If you don't hurry, you'll lose them." Hikaru said.

"Don't get lost without me!" Sayaka said, running off. Hikaru shook her head. She'd be back in fifteen minutes when she started to annoy the other girls, and Hikaru was perfectly content to sit back and finish her sketches while she waited.

-:(&):-

Hikaru checked the time. It had been two and a half hours since Sayaka had left to catch up to Uiharu and her friends. She'd gotten a text from Sayaka saying that she was okay about half an hour ago, so Hikaru wasn't particularly worried. Still, she was getting bored waiting for Sayaka to return. Perhaps she should tell Sayaka that she was heading home, and ask her to meet back at the dorms later.

She'd put the finishing touches on her sketches an hour back, and was anxious to get to work on her… she wasn't sure exactly what she was going to call it yet. One of the internal mirrors were misaligned, but once she put the final touches on it, she'd be ready. Sayaka would be fine getting home on her own, she was sure. She opened her phone, typing out a text to Sayaka to let her know not to look for her in the park.

"Help!" a voice called out, and Hikaru's eyes were drawn to young woman surrounded by five teenagers, some of them obviously showing off powers. She looked around the park, noting with relief that other people appeared to be calling on their phones; it seemed that the authorities would be alerted. No one was stepping up to help, either, but that was to be expected. No one wanted to get hurt. People were beginning to filter out of the park slowly, the woman backing up from her attackers.

Hikaru felt a twitch in her heart. Yes, the authorities would be alerted. They might even show up in time to catch the attackers. However, there was no chance they'd get there in time to help the poor woman. The woman cried out again, and Hikaru stood up. She knew that she shouldn't get involved with this. It wasn't her fight. She didn't know the woman, and if she did get involved there was a good chance she would just end up making things worse. She didn't have the ability to help, really, even if she wanted to.

 _The only power you need to 'always do what is right' is the will to do exactly that, no matter how difficult it seems._

Hikaru groaned. "Really, now is not the time." she sighed heavily, sliding off her backpack. "I should really just go." she said calmly, opening the pouch and reaching inside. "Leaving would be the better plan." slowly, she drew out a sleek black cylinder from her bag. With a radius of five centimeters and a length of twenty, the object was awkward but not impossible to hold in one hand. Holding it so that the blue arrows pointed away from her, she began to walk towards the people. "Which is why I guess it's good that I'm a foolish kid, huh?" she pointed the device at the boy nearest to the woman, creating a small light inside the device. A strong beam of coherent laser light erupted from the end of the device, tagging the boy. Apparently, even this guiding light was more powerful than she'd intended, as the boy turned to her immediately, slapping at the point of contact with an expression of annoyance and minor pain.

"What the hell?" the boy said, snarling at her.

"Stop." Hikaru said. "This is a 1 watt beam, currently. You are feeling roughly 1 in 3000 of the full force of this weapon. Please, do not-"

The boy threw a knife at Hikaru, and she instantly ramped up to full power, flaring her light as bright as she could make it and slicing through the knife as it passed. The knife split evenly down a thin line from the laser light as she drew it upwards, the beam puncturing through the metal like it wasn't there. Unfortunately, the cut was also clean enough that very little extra energy was transferred to the blade, and Hikaru was still forced to dodge out of the way of what was now two red hot knives, the path of flight largely unchanged. She recovered quickly, realigning her beam on the boy and pulsing harder this time. The boy yelled out in pain, and his clothes caught fire.

"That was 100 watts." Hikaru said. "Do anything else, and I'll hit you with 200 watts." she waved the beam over at the other teens as well. At least it looked like it was working. Normally, lasers of the strength she could create would have done far less damage then hers were, but her output beam had a radius of only a third of a millimeter, making her cuts very fine but very deep. She was delivering enough light to fully illuminate a room to an area the size of the tip of a pen. Of course it was going to hurt. Her normally disperse light was fairly useless as a weapon, but draw it together this thin and, well, she could cut through solid steel.

She could already feel the tube heating up. The internal mirrors were very high quality, nearly 99.98% efficient, but with the number of deflections required to align the light into a coherent beam that still meant that a good 1% or so of the energy was getting lost as waste heat. If this ran too long, she'd have to stop for fear of getting burned.

"Get her!" one of the teens cried, and Hikaru sighed. So much for scaring them away. She trained the beam on her nearest opponent, flaring a 200 watt light for a tenth of a second before turning to her next target. One by one, using very short bursts, she disabled her attackers as they attempted to approach her. They didn't change their attack tactics, which was good for Hikaru. She didn't have a backup plan. It took her only about one second to tag them all. Their clothes all burst into flame, and she'd left them each with a thin, needle-like two centimeter deep incision in their legs. The weapon was self-cauterizing at least, so she didn't have to worry about accidentally killing someone by making them bleed out.

There was some yelling, and then a bolt of lightning struck right next to Hikaru. Hikaru's heart sank. They were getting to their feet, and seemed to be more worried with the fire than the beam damage. It sort of made sense, she supposed. The cut was so thin that not much had actually been hit, even if it had sliced relatively deep.

"Oh, come on." Hikaru said under her breath. "If I do enough to disable you, I'll have to damage you permanently. Please, give up." she lifted the beam, trying to keep calm. Raising her voice, she called out to them. "Next burst is 3 Kilowatts. That'll cut straight through you, through the person behind you, and half-way through the next person in about half a second. This is your final warning."

"Scatter and surround her!" one of them cried, and Hikaru rolled her eyes. Of course, now was exactly when they'd start growing a brain and surround the person with a linear only attack. She acted quickly, aiming low and flaring her power as hard as she could. If she was lucky, she'd only cut off someone's foot or something.

She heard the little clink of the misaligned mirror coming loose just as her burst went off. The beam scattered left and up, punching a little hole in the side of a building nearby before tunneling its way through the brick wall and streaking off to infinity. She nearly dropped the device as the temperature jumped twenty degrees, finally drawing her focus back enough for her to remember to turn off her light. The beam stopped firing.

Hikaru looked at the teenagers, who were thankfully stunned by the display enough to not immediately begin attacking. She looked down at her device, now undeniably broken. She looked back at the teenagers, who were beginning to shake off their stunned looks.

Hikaru turned and ran. There was some angry yelling, and she saw another lightening burst touch down just behind her. She ran faster. "Bad plan, bad plan, bad plan, bad plan!" she said to herself, just trying to put distance between herself and her pursuers. "A stupid-good alignment makes for a dead hero, Hikaru!"

She bolted for the nearest alley. Powers usually had a line of sight requirement, and after they had seen her demonstrations, they probably wouldn't want to follow her into a tight, narrow corridor. Also, hopefully she'd be able to lose them in the branching paths behind the buildings. It was her best shot, at least right now.

Ducking between the skyscrapers, Hikaru scanned the alleyway for anywhere to turn, but came up empty. At least it wasn't a dead end. She ran hard, hoping against all odds to be able to make it through before the teenagers caught up to her. There was some yelling at a distance behind her just before she managed to reach the street beyond. Hikaru didn't turn, instead lowering her center of mass and running harder, making herself a smaller target as she took the final steps through the alley and into the city beyond.

She didn't stop, turning left immediately and running as hard as she could down the street. There were far more people on this road, enough that she thought it unlikely that she would be attacked here, at least not with esper powers. Still, they could easily chase and grab her, and it wouldn't take them very long to drag her off to a nice quiet corner with very few onlookers. Academy City was very 'out of sight, out of mind', and the most that anyone would do was call Judgement or Anti-Skill for her. She'd be broken and bleeding in some corner somewhere an hour before any help showed up. No, she wasn't safe here. She needed to lose them, needed to lose them completely, or it wouldn't matter.

Her breath started to come out in little bursts, and Hikaru recognized the signs of oxygen depletion and overexertion beginning to manifest themselves in the throbbing of blood in her ears and the heat poring off of her face. She consciously forced herself to take deeper breaths, but it was difficult to manage. She was a ten year old without any physical training trying to outrun fifteen and sixteen year olds. That she'd managed as well as she had was remarkable in and of itself. It wouldn't last much longer.

Using the inside of her device as a mirror, Hikaru quickly assessed where her hunters were. She saw them pushing past the light congestion fifteen meters behind her, people giving them strange looks and trying to get out of their way. They were gaining on her already, albeit slowly. Hikaru forced her already tired legs to push harder, to take her a little farther, returning her full attention to the road in front of her. She blew past a street vendor at five meters per second, faster than she thought herself capable of. Still, she knew that such speeds were trivial for fit teens to manage, even if they pressed her to her limit. The man at the street stand yelled after her, and Hikaru closed her eyes, listening. Two and a half seconds later, the man yelled out again, and there was a crashing sound. Hikaru didn't waste time, using what she could only hope was at least a momentary distraction to sprint across the street and into an alley on the other side of the road. She barely missed getting hit by a car, passing in front of it less than a tenth of a second before it would have clipped her, hearing the tires screech horribly as she sped her way to the far buildings.

Passing over the lip and into the alley, Hikaru was immediately faced with a series of paths to choose from, almost laughing with relief as she took a turn in a random direction, still running as hard as she could. If she could just get really, really lost, then they'd probably give up trying to chase her once they got bored. After all, she hadn't done that much to…

Oh, yeah. Her laser had burned off their clothes. She'd forgotten about that part.

Hikaru shook her head, forcing herself to keep going despite how much her body commanded her to stop. They wouldn't just give up. She had done something to them, something both painful and embarrassing. There was no way they'd give up the chase until either they were forced too or a good long while passed. She let out a little whimper. There was no way she'd be able to keep it up at this speed for more than a few minutes more. She had to find a safe haven, and she had to do it fast.

Easier said than done, as all things seemed. The only person she'd managed to lose in all of this was herself, and it wasn't like safe zones were the sort of thing she'd made a note of before anyway. They'd never been important before. She had no target, and no good way of determining one. Her head was throbbing from her exertion, and it was becoming harder and harder to think, too. If and when they caught her, she'd be down on her greatest weapon.

So she kept running. Wherever she needed to be, it couldn't be a bad idea to get there faster, and since she had no idea where to head anyway, any direction was as good as any other. She turned left, right, left again, winding her way through the corridors behind the buildings. Ghostly footsteps followed her, keeping close behind her as she fled. Hikaru was unsure if they were that of her pursuers or her own footfalls echoing off the buildings, and she wasn't about to stop to find out.

Taking a sharp, blind turn, Hikaru slammed into a mesh of wiring, feeling an electric pulse travel down her body the instant she made contact. She spasmed, her body flinging itself back by nearly three meters from the wall, slamming her into the concrete floor with considerable force. Everything went numb, and her vision went white, then black, then red in the space of half a second.

It didn't really hurt all that much, strangely. Perhaps her body had become so flooded with pain signals that her brain had simply opted to filter them out. Or maybe it was just shock. Hikaru couldn't tell. She hadn't blacked out either, it seemed. She could still see the electric sparks discharging off of the electrified mesh from where she had contacted it, the mesh itself still vibrating slightly from the impact. She'd hit the wall seconds ago, and any lapse in consciousness would have had to be very, very brief. Her mind was also fairly clear, which struck Hikaru as strange. Or, maybe clear wasn't quite right; she was having trouble keeping more than one thought in her head at a time. Calm, that was more accurate. Her mind was calm now. She felt like she was ready to go to sleep, except that she wasn't particularly tired. She didn't quite mind the feeling.

Hikaru stared up at the sky, just watching the clouds slowly drift past for a good minute or so as she let herself enjoy the calm feeling she was experiencing. Eventually, she tried to move, but found herself unable. Somehow, she felt that she should be concerned at this, but she couldn't bring herself to get worked up about it. It seemed so trivial. Something to be explored at leisure, not to worry over. Taking her time, Hikaru blinked once or twice, experimented with taking over breathing manually, and then slowly wiggled her left pinky toe. It was a slow process, taking nearly a minute, but her body did respond. She was partly paralyzed, but it seemed to be more from overexertion and burnout than from any nervous system damage. She tried to smile, her lips having a hard time getting into position, lazily following her command. See? Nothing to worry about.

After lying there for a few minutes more, Hikaru slowly tried to pull herself into an upright position, giving up and lying flat down after a few seconds of effort. She couldn't imagine laying down on the ground like that could be a good idea, but it was so hard to move still. She lifted her head again, this time making some progress, managing to pull herself shakily into a sitting positon. There was a little message in her head telling her that she needed to go somewhere, though she couldn't remember where. She could recognize large gaps in her memory, though the blank spaces felt more like soft barriers than holes. She was sure it would all come back with enough time. She looked back at the electrified mesh barrier. It was quite rude of someone to put that right there, so close to the corner. She hadn't even seen it there before running straight into it. Someone must really, really not want people in the area.

She didn't recognize where she was. She was fairly sure that this wasn't just one of those soft memory gaps, either. This place was unfamiliar to her. Hikaru was still having a hard time being sure of anything, but she was fairly certain that she wouldn't have ran full speed into an unknown area unless she had a good reason. That meant that either she saw something or someone that she felt she absolutely had to follow for some reason, or she had been running from something.

Her mind clicked, and Hikaru shook her head hard, or as hard as her stunned unresponsive muscles would let her, trying to clear the calming fog that clouded her thoughts. Yes, she had been running. Running from a group, mostly teenage boys. She couldn't remember why exactly, but she knew they were bad news. Sayaka was gone, she'd gone off to see someone a while ago. Hikaru couldn't remember who she was with, but at least that meant she wasn't in any danger. One less thing to worry about. Hikaru tried and failed to get to her feet, falling over again from the effort and lying face down on the street. She groaned lightly, more from exasperation and the simple unfairness of it all than from any pain. Slowly, she pushed herself up with her arms, tucking her legs beneath her and retaking a sitting position, kneeling on her knees. Using the wall as a support, she arduously pulled herself into a standing position. Walking unaided was out of the question, it seemed, and running an impossibility.

"I know she turned down here!" Hikaru heard a voice call, and she felt a cold chill sweep through her already numb body. "She's got to be around here somewhere…"

"I'm going to cave her skull in when we find her." a deeper voice muttered. "Do you know how retarded I look with one of the legs of my pants burned off?"

"I'm not going to be able to run straight for weeks with this hole in my leg. She cut right into my calf muscles." another complained. "What the hell did she hit us with?"

Hikaru stopped listening as soon as she determined roughly how far away they were. It seemed that her attacks had disabled them, at least partly, so they'd be walking if they could help it. That gave her maybe twenty-five seconds until they found her. Consciously suppressing another groan, Hikaru stumbled her way towards the electric mesh, leaning down and picking up her device from where she had dropped it. Carefully, she summoned a small light in the tube. She felt a warmth on her stomach, and traced the laser to where it was pointing, illuminating her shirt in its glow. The dot was moving slowly, too. Hikaru switched off her light. It wasn't just a misaligned beam, it was a roaming beam. Completely useless. She'd have no way of targeting, and she was just as likely to hit a wall or the ground or even herself as she was her opponents. So, that option was out. What else could she try? If she could trick them into hitting the electric mesh… but she'd have to get them to chase her again, and there was no way she'd be able to run quickly enough to dodge out of the way herself in this condition. Or even to make it to the mesh before they caught her. They'd have to be impossibly stupid to miss her if she tried to hide here, and there was no way she could disguise herself. She could try to take them in hand-to-hand, though she knew how well that would go. She might get an 'awesomeness by analysis' bonus, but that wouldn't even come close to making up for the six to one odds, the six year age gap, the esper level difference, or the partial paralysis. Let alone all four.

"There she is!" one of the teenagers yelled, pointing at Hikaru and waving his friends over. Hikaru sat down, whimpering. That was it. Her mind locked up, and she just watched as they approached her slowly. What the hell had she been thinking? She was a ten-year-old level 2 with a new toy and a genius complex. Somehow, she'd convinced herself that she was capable of anything, despite the fact that she knew that there was no way that could be even remotely true. All things considered, she'd done surprisingly well. But she didn't get a free pass from reality, no matter how smart she thought she was. She hadn't been prepared for this. And now she was going to pay for going in too deep.

"Hold it!" there was the sound of rushing air, and a girl stepped out of nowhere in the space between Hikaru and the teenagers. In her dazed state, and facing the girl from behind, it took Hikaru a second to recognize the girl as Shirai. Shirai pointed her finger menacingly out at the six teens, who had paused in their advance with her arrival. "I'm with Judgement!"

"I wasn't aware they accepted grade schoolers now." one of the boys said, and the others laughed. They started approaching again, one of them sending lightning crackling around himself, the other tossing a fireball between his palms.

Shirai sighed, withdrawing a few white darts from a pouch on her leg. "Okay, first off." she started, her tone measured and cool. Hikaru couldn't see it from her angle, but she assumed that she was casting her eyes around for relative coordinate positions to use in her teleportation calculations. "Judgment has accepted grade schoolers for nearly twenty years now. Second –" the darts disappeared from her fingers, and Hikaru heard pained noises from the teenagers. "I'm a second year junior high student, actually." she started walking towards them slowly, pulling out a fan of handcuffs from behind her back. "Now, I've embedded those darts about a centimeter and a half into your skin. Come quietly, and that's all the injury you'll suffer. Try anything, and the next ones will find their way eight centimeters deep. Sometimes you don't ever walk again after that. Understand?"

"Bitch." one of them spat, flaring an electric bolt at Shirai. She barely flinched, taking the lightning strike straight to the chest like it was a paintball. She turned her gaze to him, and with a quick flick of her wrist three more of her darts disappeared, accompanied by pained yelling from the perpetrator.

"I told you not to do that." Shirai said. "Now, if no one else wants to be stupid, we can get this over with. I'd like to be done here quickly, and trust me, your focus should be on making me happy right now." there were no objections. Shirai smiled. "Good. I'm glad we understand each other."

Shirai worked quickly, cuffing the teenagers and calling Anti-Skill for pick-up. Then, she turned to Hikaru.

"I know two people who will be happy that you didn't get yourself killed." she said. Glancing down at Hikaru, she tilted her head, frowning. "Are you injured? Do you need medical assistance?"

"No." Hikaru said mutely.

"Okay then." Shirai didn't drop her frown, and Hikaru noticed another set of cuffs in her hands. "Now, I don't know exactly what happened," she said, giving Hikaru a long look, "but I would like to remind you that the use of esper powers on other people is strictly prohibited unless in self-defense." Hikaru opened her mouth, but Shirai put up her hand. "Nope! No talking. The punishment for breaking this law is one month of community service and/or a 30,000 ¥ fine if no significant injury results, with additional charges being placed depending on the nature of the offense." Shirai paused. "So it would be pretty bad if you had done that." she paused again. "But I don't see any direct evidence, and there's been no major injuries or property damage, so I'm not that interested in looking. That is, as long as you understand that doing that would be a crime, and that you know never to do it again. Hypothetically, if you had done it this time."

Hikaru nodded. "I understand. Hypothetically."

"Good. I'm glad we have a hypothetical understanding." Shirai said. "Which, of course, is all we need, because you didn't do anything anyway."

"Right." Hikaru said.

"In all seriousness." Shirai said, her gaze softening. "If you really want to go after villains, you should try out for Judgment. It's legal, and you're much more likely to not end up cornered, helpless, waiting to be rescued after your plan goes wrong."

Hikaru nodded. Again, she had tried to be a hero. Again, she had ended up defeated, saved only through the luck of rescuers showing up at exactly the right time. Perhaps the universe was sending her a message. Maybe it was best if she really did just stick to self-defense.

"Do you need help getting home?" Shirai asked. "I have to stay here to wait for Anti-Skill, but I can call my partner to take you if you'd like."

Hikaru was about to request a map, when she remembered who Shirai's partner was. "Um, I would like that." Hikaru said. "I'm… a bit shaken. Actually, I might be in shock. I'm not sure. I did run into that electrified fence pretty hard." she pointed to the mesh barrier just behind her. "It took me about five minutes before I could stand up again."

"First time being electrified?" Shirai asked. "If you can move fine now, you'll be okay. The first time is always the worse."

Hikaru was unsure how Shirai had such knowledge, though she did vaguely remember Uiharu mentioning 'direct electric strikes', so maybe there was something to it. Shirai took out her cellphone and made a call, pausing for a moment as she waited to be picked up.

"Uiharu-" Shirai started, then removed the phone from her ear. Hikaru could hear the buzzing from the speaker for a moment. When it had calmed down, she put it back to her ear. "Yes, Hikaru's fine. I'm glad you're so concerned for your partner." she paused for a while, tapping her foot slowly as Uiharu defended herself. "I know, I'm just playing with you. Look, she's really shaken. Would you mind coming and picking her up for me, taking her home? I'm sure you two won't mind-" Shirai took the phone off of her ear again, sighing as the loud buzzing restarted. "Yes, okay. I'll expect you here soon, then." she exited the call, turning to Hikaru. "She's coming."

Uiharu showed up shortly, panting and out of breath. Misaka, Saten, and Sayaka followed close behind, though they didn't seem nearly as tired. As soon as Sayaka saw her, she rushed to Hikaru, drawing her into a hug. "Oh, Hikaru, I told you not to get lost without me." she said. "I'm so happy you're alright." she gave Hikaru a sad look. "Don't get into adventures alone, okay? You need someone to help you."

"Don't worry." Hikaru said quietly. "I don't intend on getting into any adventures at all if I can help it. I think I've had enough of heroics for a lifetime."

"Come on." Uiharu said kindly. "I'll get you two home now."

Hikaru stood up slowly, still a bit shaky from the electric shock, nodding to Uiharu. "I'm ready to go." she said. "I think I've seen more than enough."

Uiharu led Hikaru away, Sayaka and Saten following close behind. Misaka flashed Hikaru a smile before turning to talk to Shirai. Hikaru wasn't quite sure what that was supposed to mean, but she figured it was a positive gesture.

Hikaru waited until they'd made it some distance before turning to Uiharu. "Okay. Stop me if I'm wrong. Sayaka receives a text from me that paused in the middle of a sentence. Then, reports start coming in of an attack in the park I'm in, and you get worried. Someone gets the brilliant idea to try to trace my phone; I'm assuming that Judgement can do that without too much trouble. Or, at least Uiharu can. I'm not talking or texting, so you'd have to rely on update packets, and it would probably take you a while to get a lock. Then, suddenly, the signal cuts out – I'd just run into an electric fence, and my phone shorted out. You have a rough zone, and you just had Shirai teleport around until she saw me. That's why you were so close, and how you knew that I was in danger."

"Wow, you're good at that." Saten said. "Are you a detective, like, um, that British guy?"

Hikaru sighed. "No. I'm just observant. If I got it right, that means that I've calmed down enough to start thinking clearly again. Which is a good sign."

Hikaru felt a gaze on her, and turned to catch Uiharu with stars in her eyes before the older girl could master herself. Hikaru couldn't help but feel a little pleased at that, even if the admiration was undeserved. Uiharu blushed when she saw Hikaru looking, sheepishly wringing her hands together. "Um…" she started. "Would you like to get something to eat with us first, before heading home?" she asked hopefully.

"I suppose it is only around 15:00." Hikaru said, checking her watch on instinct before remembering that it too had been shorted out. "Though, that is an awkward time for a meal."

"We didn't eat lunch, though." Sayaka said. "We'd love to." she nudged Hikaru, leaning in and whispering. "After all, she seems fairly approachable." Hikaru flushed, giving Sayaka a dirty look. Sayaka just grinned. "Friends help friends out." she said teasingly. "I'm just returning the favor."

Uiharu managed to keep back any involuntary noises of joy, and Hikaru found herself having a hard time facing the older girl. "I mean, if it's okay with you…" Uiharu said.

"Oh, come on. You two really should just kiss already." Saten said. Hikaru and Uiharu both blushed deeper, turning away from each other to Saten's laughter. "Follow me. I know a good place around here." she said, waving them on.

They followed Saten for a while, passing though more unfamiliar parts of the city. Hikaru did her best to pay attention to any major landmarks as they walked; for all the intellectual tools at her disposal, photographic memory was not something she possessed. After about five minutes, Misaka and Shirai caught up to them, joining the group. Hikaru was almost disappointed that they had, as she was certain that Sayaka's attention would draw Misaka into the conversation and decrease the amount of time she could spend talking to Uiharu. Still, their arrival seemed to calm Uiharu down, which was good at least.

"Hey, what's the tube you're carrying?" Misaka asked, pointing to Hikaru's device. "You didn't have it back in the park."

"Oh. This." Hikaru said. "It was in my bag before. It's nothing important." she tried to sound as inconspicuous as possible, but from what she knew of tonal cues she was aware that she was doing a very bad job.

"Really?" Misaka asked. "It looks pretty cool." she prodded, obviously not convinced.

Hikaru sighed. "It's… something I built. Or, was building, more accurately. My power is the ability to create blue light. That's it. I can make the light pretty bright for short periods, but other than blinding someone who happens to be looking straight at it, it's pretty ineffective as a weapon." she paused. "This is an internal reflector and beam collator. It makes that which is disperse concentrated."

"It's an esper-power laser." Misaka said.

"Lacer, more accurately." Hikaru said. "Continuous emission, because there's no medium to stimulate. But, yeah. Basically."

"That sounds awesome." Saten said. "Can I see?"

"It's broken. One of the internal mirrors became misaligned, and the beam wanders." Hikaru said. "I've got to see if I can fix it. I hope I can. It cost nearly 1.5 million ¥ to build."

"Geez." Saten said, exhaling hard. "That's a really expensive tube."

"How powerful?" Misaka asked.

"My maximum output is about three kilowatts. The beam has a diameter of about 650 micrometers." Hikaru said

"Impressive." Misaka said. "That would give you about 900 kilowatts per square centimeter of photonic pressure. That's 75% of what the meltdowner gets." she paused. "Sure, it's over an area about 3,000 times smaller, but still."

"Yay. I can output 1 part in 4000 of what the most powerful photomaster can. Success." Hikaru said dryly. "Forgive me if I don't attempt any level 5 take-downs quite yet."

"I'm just saying, you can do more than you think." Misaka said.

"I know." Hikaru sighed. "I'm just really not in the mood right now. I want to be allowed to feel bad about myself for a little bit, okay? I did something stupid, and the last thing I need right now is to be convinced that it wasn't."

"I think you're overestimating the amount of danger you need to be able to deal with." Saten said. "I mean, how many times do you think you're going to need to do level 5 takedowns, realistically?"

"Seven or less, presumably." Hikaru said, then paused. "Six or less if you discount her." she nodded at Misaka.

Saten sighed. "What, you think that you're going to need to-"

"That was a joke." Hikaru said. "Realistically? Zero. I know that. I just can't stop thinking of worst cases."

"Hey, I get wrapped up in her fights sometimes, and I'm level 0. Trust me, it's survivable if you know what you're doing." Saten said, nodding at Misaka. "And I'm only two years older than you are, give or take."

"You have support." Hikaru said, then sighed. "Then again, I'm not in a position where I should need support. Trouble won't find me if I don't go looking, and I've gotten bit enough to stop looking." Hikaru sighed. "I don't know why I'm telling you this. We met only a few hours ago. We're not friends yet. You don't want to hear about my personal problems."

"Well, this is how friendship starts. A little trust, some Q and A, and a willingness to listen." Saten said. "If I didn't want to hear it, I'd stop asking."

"You four are so friendly." Hikaru said. She paused, looking at Shirai for a moment. "Well, three of you are, and the fourth doesn't seem unfriendly, anyway."

"Hey." Shirai said. "Didn't I just save you ten minutes ago? I'd expect a little more respect and gratitude than that."

"Case and point." Hikaru said, and Shirai scowled. "But, her notwithstanding, you've all been very accepting of me and Sayaka."

"Hey, I'm allowed to be a nice person." Misaka said. "And you certainly don't make for a dull conversation partner."

"Aha!" Saten said. "We're here." she gestured to what appeared to be an American-style diner.

"I recognize this." Hikaru said. "It's not too far from my school."

"Hey, then we're closer together then I thought!" Saten said. "Do you plan on attending Sakugawa Middle School next year?"

"Hm. I was more thinking Sakura University." Hikaru said. "My mock entrance exam scores were good enough to get me into most mid-level universities, and I could really do with the scholarship money."

"An eleven-year-old university student?" Saten said, giggling.

"Trust me, it's not that far-fetched." Sayaka said. "She's already co-authored a published scientific paper, and her placement exam scores look pretty good. Any university would be happy to have her. It'll be sad to see her go, but I'm happy for her."

"You're actually serious." Saten said deadpan, looking between the two girls. "You really intend to apply to a university." she paused. "Straight out of grade school."

"You're close friends with someone who can shoot a billion volts from her hand." Hikaru said flatly. "It's not all that strange."

"Fair enough." Saten conceded.

"Hey, are we going to go in or not?" Misaka asked. "I'm getting hungry just standing here."

"Sorry." Saten and Hikaru said simultaneously.

They headed inside the diner, seating themselves to wait to order. Hikaru looked around, shaking her head. What a strange six hours it had been. She glanced at Uiharu's nervous smile, Misaka's strong grin, Saten's repressed giggle, and Shirai wrestling with Sayaka for the seat next to Misaka.

Maybe, despite the risks, this whole exploration thing had an upside.


	3. Optics 1-2

Optics 1.2

 _-Nineteen days later-_

"What did you need these for again, anyway?" Kazuki asked, carrying a box of plastic toys and placing it down next to Hikaru.

"Target practice." Hikaru said, carefully tightening a screw onto the core of her device, making sure to keep it flush with the mirrored interior. She put down the screwdriver and looked up at Kazuki. "You did bring only things you were willing to have destroyed, right?"

"Yeah." he shook the box. "Just some old toys I've grown out of and never thrown away, plus some of the collection you had under your bed that you told me you just 'left there to tell Sayaka you hadn't thrown her presents out'." he sighed. "Where is Sayaka, anyway? I haven't seen her outside of class for a few days."

"Probably annoying Misaka." Hikaru said.

"I leave you two alone for fourteen days, and when I get back to you Sayaka is casually in a position to 'annoy' the Railgun and you're talking about training for Judgement. " Kazuki said, shaking his head. "I hope that I'm not what's holding you two back from doing awesome stuff, because that would make me very sad."

"It was more random chance than anything else." Hikaru said. "And you don't hold us back, Kazuki. I don't think anything holds Sayaka back, and all you do for me is get me to see the obvious flaws in my plans. That's not 'holding back' as much as 'keeping safe'."  
"Yeah, well, when you two decide to go save the world, at least send me a postcard." Kazuki said, and Hikaru punched him lightly on the shoulder.

"Aw, come on. You know we'd at least get you a souvenir." Hikaru said. Kazuki scowled, and Hikaru sighed. "Here. Look, I'll let you play with the death ray. That's something Sayaka hasn't done."

"Death ray?" Kazuki said.

"Here." Hikaru gave a sleek black tube to Kazuki. "Point the end with the blue arrows away from you, and press the silver button."

Kazuki did so, gasping as eight long slivery fans folded out of the device.

"Those are just the heat sinks and radiators." Hikaru said. "Otherwise it will overheat. The death comes out of the little hole."

"How do you turn it on?" he asked, holding it with special care, like he thought it might bite him at any moment.

"There's no power source. Don't get so worried," Hikaru said. "You can't accidentally turn it on. I'm the only one who can power it. Give me a second." She closed her eyes, bringing a small light to life inside the device. Kazuki gasped. "No need to freak out," Hikaru said. She waved her hand in front of the beam. "It's only about three watts right now, and the focus is set to 6500 micrometers. It could pop a balloon every three seconds, maybe." she took one of the plastic toys out of the box, placing it on a concrete platform across the room. "Point it at that, okay?"

Kazuki followed her instructions, bringing the beam to point at what Hikaru was pretty sure was a Gekota toy that Sayaka had given her at some point in the past. "Is anything going to happen?" he asked.

"Not at three watts," Hikaru said. "Are you steady? I'm going to flare three kilowatts, okay?" Kazuki nodded, and Hikaru pushed her power as far as she could, brightening her light until the laser became hard to look at. The Gekota was engulfed in flame in less than a tenth of a second, and the beam tunneled its way through and out the other side in about six seconds. Hikaru let the light fade. "It'll pack quite the punch, but as you can see, the beam doesn't slice through the toy like butter. That was one of the biggest problems with the first design. It only had one mode, and that mode only let me either do basically no damage, or instant kill, with no real in-between. But now that I can spread the light over an area 100 times larger, I have a lot more versatility." she paused. "Try turning the top clockwise until it clicks twice."

Kazuki did so. "What did that do?" he asked.

"Narrowed the beam back to its original 650 micrometers." Hikaru said, placing a new toy on the stand after carefully putting the fire on the old one out. "Now it's a proper death ray."

"The last one wasn't?" Kazuki said incredulously.

"Well, not an instant death ray. You could get hit with that one for a second or two and live, though you might wish you hadn't." Hikaru said. "This one, though… well, you'll see."

Kazuki lined up, pointing the device at the target. Hikaru once again let her power flare, this time for only half of a second. There was a hole straight through the toy, a clean bore barely wide enough to fit the writing element of a mechanical pencil through. The hole continued through the bricks stacked on the wall behind it, piercing two all the way through and half way through a third. Hikaru showed Kazuki the bricks.

"That was half a second." she said. "It can punch through about forty centimeters of brick, twenty-five centimeters of steel, or fifty-five centimeters of flesh in one second."

"Why did you build this?" Kazuki asked.

"It's good to have a way to defend yourself, even if you don't expect to use it." Hikaru said. "Besides, there's always a chance I'll find some practical application for it. A cutting tool like this is bound to have uses."

"I suppose." Kazuki said. "Just, please, don't do anything stupid."

"Like what?" Hikaru asked, taking the lacer tube back from Kazuki. "Go out and fight crime at night?" she smiled coyly. "I sleep through classes enough already without a night life. I don't think I could manage to keep a double life like that active for very long." she sighed, looking Kazuki straight in the eyes. "Seriously, though, I'm not interested in being a hero. My success count is zero to two right now, and I've gotten the message. This hero business is not for me. A success in my book would be never having to use this in combat."

Kazuki let out a sigh of relief, then nodded at Hikaru, smiling. "Okay then. I guess that would be more Sayaka's thing anyway. I was just worried, that's all. You building weapons and hanging out with powerful people, it makes me nervous."

"I can see why it would." Hikaru said. "Don't worry. I have no interest in pursuing danger, and I know the tricks to keep Sayaka down too."

"So, what now?" Kazuki asked. "Now that you're done with the, uh, death ray, what's the plan?"

"Hm, well, while I have you here, I could use some assistance cleaning the lab." Hikaru said, gesturing around at the makeshift workshop area that she had made from her dorm basement. There was quite a bit of clutter around from old projects and her tests. Kazuki groaned, and Hikaru laughed. "Oh, I'm kidding. I wouldn't keep you here for something like that. I was going to run more tests to make sure the device works first, but if you want we can do something else. Did you have anything in mind?"

"Um, actually, if you wouldn't mind, I need some help on my homework." Kazuki said. "The science lost me this time, and I don't even really understand what it's trying to ask us."

"Oh, yeah, we have homework for Saturday, don't we?" Hikaru said. "Maybe I should look at that."

Kazuki sighed. "Well, if you haven't done it yet, then maybe you shouldn't be helping me."

"Oh, nonsense." Hikaru said dismissively, walking over to a desk and motioning Kazuki to her side. "It won't be a challenge, I can guarantee it."

"Oh, wow, that sure makes me feel good about my ability." Kazuki said dryly.

"Shhh." Hikaru said teasingly. "If you want, I'll give myself a handicap. I've got a chess-computer, and I'll set maximum round length to ten seconds, put the computer on highest difficulty, and play against it while trying to do the homework."

"Really?" Kazuki asked. "Is that what a suitable mental workout is for the great Hikaru?"

"Hardly. It would still be abysmally easy. But it would seem more impressive." Hikaru said.

"Wonderful." Kazuki sighed. "You know, maybe I should just go to someone else."

"Don't be like that." Hikaru said. "You know that I'm just teasing you. Can I see the homework?"

"Yeah, yeah." Kazuki handed her a few sheets of paper. "It's something on fluid dynamics in three dimensions. One of the challenge problems."

Hikaru's eyes flashed over the page. "Oh, this? I'm sure I can solve it. Though, it does look harder than I thought it would…"

-:(&):-

"For those of you worried, the seventh challenge problem on fluid dynamics was printed with an error which would require you to prove the smoothness of Navier-Strokes equation to solve correctly. I'm throwing out the question from grading." Ms. Bunko said, to much happy sighing from the class.

"Now you tell me." Hikaru growled, dejectedly looking at her thirty-seven pages of work and slamming her head into her desk in exasperation. "I thought this looked familiar."

"Unless Hikaru has come up with an answer." Ms. Bunko said questioningly, and Hikaru raised her head.

"I'm sorry, solving a Millennium problem in a single night is a little bit out of my reach." she said.

"Too bad. You could have used the 117 million ¥." Ms. Bunko said. "Think about it a little more and tell me when you finish, okay? I expect a full solution by Monday." There was laughter from around the class.

"No." Hikaru said flatly. "I am not so petty as to not acknowledge defeat. I never want to see another fluid dynamics equation for the rest of my life." Kazuki nodded tiredly next to her. They had been up all night trying to solve the problem, and had made precious little progress. On the up side, both Hikaru and Kazuki were now probably qualified to pass most undergraduate level exams on fluid dynamics. On the down side, Hikaru wasn't sure she could see another time integral of flow without seizing up and dying a little bit inside.

Normally, this would be where Sayaka would enter the conversation, but her desk was strangely empty today. It wouldn't be the first time Sayaka had been late for class, though usually she would have shown up by now if she intended on showing up at all. Maybe she had had a long night, or was sick. Hikaru made a mental note to check on Sayaka after classes were over.

Though, actually, now that she was thinking about it, Hikaru could have sworn that Sayaka hadn't come home last night. She and Kazuki had been up all night working, after all. If she'd come in, Hikaru was sure they'd have noticed, especially if it was at a strange hour. They'd have loved the excuse to stop working and investigate for a little while. She'd been too tired to really note it, and too busy with her work to think about it, but the last time that she'd seen Sayaka had been yesterday right after class had ended, around 15:20.

It suddenly dawned on Hikaru that she had no idea where Sayaka could be. There was no good reason she would have stayed somewhere other than the dorms last night, and even if something had come up, she would have texted at the very least. Something was wrong.

"So, continuing our discussion from last class," Ms. Bunko started, snapping Hikaru out of her train of thought, "we will be finishing our overview of basic system dynamics today." she shook her head, trying to grab the floating fragments of her thoughts before they dissipated. Eventually, she gave up. She needed to sleep. Hikaru took one brief glance at the board, identified no information that she didn't already know, and dropped her head onto her desk. Things would be clearer at lunchtime when she'd gotten at least three and a half hours in.

-:(&):-

"She's not answering me, either." Kazuki said. Hikaru felt a knot tie itself in her chest, but she forced herself to calm down by taking deep breaths.

"And she never replied to your texts yesterday?" Hikaru asked, and Kazuki nodded. "Okay. So. She's been without access to her phone for at least twenty hours." Hikaru said slowly, trying to keep Kazuki, and her own hyperactive mind, from jumping to conclusions.

"It's happened again, hasn't it." Kazuki said bluntly. Hikaru sighed.

"No. Or, at least, we can't say for sure." Hikaru said. "Let's not make any rash assumptions until we know more."

"Okay, then, what else could it be?" Kazuki asked.

"Well, she's been hanging out with Uiha-… with the railgun and her friends recently." Hikaru said. "Around the city's most powerful electromaster, the occasional phone short-out is unavoidable. Also, I'd imagine they get up to some adventures every now and then. Maybe she's just hurt and resting somewhere, or even unhurt and helping care for one of the others."

"Well, you could call Uiharu and check, couldn't you?" Kazuki asked.

Hikaru swallowed hard. "Y-yeah. That's a good idea." she swiped quickly to Uiharu's contact address and pressed the phone to her ear. The older girl picked up almost immediately.

"No, I really have to take this!" Uiharu's muffled voice said to an unknown individual, and then there was the sound of crinkling paper and a pause. "Hikaru!" Uiharu said. "I'm so sorry about that."

"Have I caught you at a bad time?" Hikaru asked, then shook her head. "Uh, actually, it doesn't matter. I've got a really important question for you."

"I'm listening." Uiharu said.

"When is the last time you saw Sayaka?" Hikaru asked. "Please, I know it sounds like a weird thing to ask, but I really need to know."

"How long has she been missing?" Uiharu asked, her tone intensifying. Hikaru sighed. Of course. Uiharu worked for Judgement. A question like that wouldn't possibly make it past her radar. "Uh, maybe as much as twenty-one hours." Hikaru said. "From that response, I have a feeling that the last time you saw her was a while ago."

"Not since Wednesday." Uiharu confirmed. "She was really starting to get on Shirai's nerves, and I think Misaka asked her to back off for a little bit. She hasn't been with any of us for four days."

"She was in class yesterday, but we haven't been able to contact her since." Hikaru said. "The last time I saw her for sure was 15:23 yesterday when we parted ways after class. She said something about shopping or something. I didn't pay much attention, didn't think that it would be important at the time." Hikaru said. "The first text Kazuki sent was at…" Hikaru cast her eyes down at Kazuki's phone. "15:31, and it was never replied to. She could have been walking, distracted, or otherwise indisposed at the time, so add fifteen minutes for any reasonable event that she could have been part of, round for significant digits, and she's definitely unaccounted for since 15:45 yesterday."

"Just under twenty-one hours…" Uiharu said. "That's really cold as far as being able to trace someone goes. If she's been kidnapped, they'll have had plenty of time to cover their tracks by now, and if she's been hurt and lost somewhere, she'll be in critical condition. This is one of the few times where being kidnapped is actually the better option. Either way, this is serious."

"I know." Hikaru said quietly. She shook slightly. "If it wasn't for that stupid hidden Millennium problem, I'd have put this together sooner!" she growled for a moment, then forced herself to calm down again. "But there's no use in thinking about what-ifs. Uiharu, thank you for the information." Hikaru took the phone off her ear, turning to Kazuki.

"We're in real trouble." Hikaru said. "As near as we can tell, Sayaka has been missing for twenty and three quarter hours."

"What do we do?" Kazuki asked.

"Wait!" Uiharu's voice buzzed from Hikaru's speakerphone. "Hikaru, I'm not done talking with you! I need to ask you a few more questions for my file!"

"Your…" Hikaru said.

"I'm with Judgement." Uiharu said. "Remember? Helping solve problems like yours is actually my job."

Hikaru felt a warmth flood back into her body, and Kazuki sighed in relief. "You'll help us find her?" Kazuki asked.

"No. I'll find her for you." Uiharu said strongly. "You shouldn't get involved with this. I'll make sure that you're up to date and as well informed as any member of my team, but this isn't work for civilians."

"You let me come along." Saten's voice said from the speaker. "What's going on? I just heard the last part of that, figure you're getting a new case."

"Saten, this is Hikaru. I'm here with one of my friends, Katashi Kazuki." Hikaru said. "Sayaka's gone missing."

"What?" Saten said. "Wait, how long ago?"

"Almost a day now." Uiharu informed her.

"We'd hoped that she was with you, but…" Hikaru paused, letting the silence say what she didn't want to.

"Was she kidnapped?" Saten asked. "Again?" she added, after a short pause.

"We don't know." Hikaru said. "We don't know anything except that she's been missing since somewhere between 15:23 and 15:45 yesterday."

"Look, lunch is almost over." Uiharu said. "I'm going to call in on official business and get right to work. I'll call you once your school gets out, around 15:30."

"Hey, I've got a better idea." Saten said. "Why don't you two come down to the office after school? Uiharu works office 177, right?"

"No, I don't want them involved!" Uiharu said.

"177?" Hikaru asked.

"Yeah. Should be marked on any city map application you have." Saten said. Uiharu pouted in the background. "If not, call me after school and I'll give you directions."

"You're all conspiring against me!" Uiharu said in a despairing voice.

"We'll see you in three hours, then." Hikaru said. "Good luck. And, uh, thank you. Really. I have a feeling we're going to need all the support we can get for this."

"We'll find her." Saten promised. "You'd be surprised what Uiharu and Shirai can get done. They'll probably have her waiting there for you when you show up."

Hikaru sighed. "I hope so."

-:(&):-

"I'm so sorry." Uiharu said. "I wish I could say otherwise, but…"

"Nothing at all?" Hikaru asked.

"Not a trace." Shirai said, pacing back and forth in the room. "We got 154 to cross-check their surveillance. Apparently, as far as the cameras are concerned, you were the last person to talk to her. She disappears in a blind spot between two cameras less than a minute after leaving you, barely around the bend. No camera picks her up after. She just disappears."

Hikaru felt a pit form in her stomach. She had been less than one hundred meters from Sayaka when it, whatever it was, had happened. So close. If she had just walked with her for a minute more…

"And there was nothing at the point of disappearance?" Kazuki asked.

"Nothing at all." Shirai said. "I spent half an hour combing those thirty square meters. If there was anything at all, I would have found it."

"We have no witness reports, no emergency calls from that time, and no strange activity in the area." Uiharu said. "Whoever did this really, really knows what they're doing."

"What do we do?" Hikaru asked.

"We keep looking." Shirai said. "I'm going to write a report on the case, see if we can get any interest from other Judgement branches or Anti-skill."

"There's a chance that whoever did this buried the information in the server." Uiharu said. "I've run most available checks, but I haven't done any internal searching yet. From how well this is covered, they might have someone inside Anti-skill helping them. I've sent a request out for permission, but if they don't get back to me in ten minutes I'm going to start and assume they'll okay it later."

"We've done all the simple, by the book things." Shirai told Hikaru and Kazuki. "But we're far from out of options."

"I found the snacks!" Saten announced, entering the room with a plate. She looked around at the others, mixed fear and determination on their faces. "Okay, I feel that that outburst might have come at a bad time. Sorry."

"No, we needed a tension diffusion." Hikaru said. "And I didn't eat lunch." she grabbed a handful of the crackers from the plate, eating them slowly. It was frustrating, just sitting here while the others did work, but Uiharu and Shirai had been very insistent on not letting Kazuki and Hikaru participate.

There was a buzz from Uiharu's computer, and she turned to them excitedly. "It looks like they responded to my request." she said, clicking into the note. Her smile dropped suddenly, and she read the note a second time. "No, that can't be right." she said, opening another tab and searching through some data entries quickly.

"What's wrong now?" Hikaru asked.

"Hibiki Sayaka has been removed from the Academy City records." Uiharu said. "I mean, all of them. We don't have her enrollment records, her payment records, transcripts, medical records, anything. She's even missing from the esper power databank. My request has been denied on the grounds that Hibiki Sayaka doesn't exist."

"What?" Saten asked. "How could that even happen?"

"I don't know." Uiharu did a quick internet search. "It's not just official documents, either. She has no web presence. It looks like they've just taken out text references, though. I can still find a few pictures of her by searching for Hikaru and Katashi. But that's it. A few pictures, probably some paper records somewhere, and our memories are all that's left of Hibiki."

"Is there anything we can do?" Hikaru asked.

"I don't know. I've never seen anything like this before. I don't know where to go from here." Uiharu said.

"No, I mean, about the data loss. Is there anything _we_ can do?" Hikaru asked.

Uiharu paused for a moment, looking at Hikaru. "You know the Judgement servers pretty well, right?"

"Intimately." Hikaru said. "I still have part of the main distribution framework's source code memorized."

"The Anti-skill databank isn't all that different." Uiharu said, waving Hikaru over. "Do you have any good cracker programs on you?"

Hikaru took a USB nub out from a bracelet and plugged it into the computer. "I've got better." she typed a few commands into the on-screen prompt, and a UI materialized on Uiharu's screen.

"Oh, isn't this just beautiful!" Uiharu said admiringly. "I'm updating your key codes. The server should let us in any second now."

"Oh, great, there are two of them." Shirai said. "Be careful not to take down the internet on accident."

"We won't." Hikaru said. "Take down the internet, I mean. We will be careful."

"What are you trying to do?" Saten asked. "If they've deleted the data, what's the point of breaking in? They don't have any information that will be useful to us."

"It doesn't matter where they've hidden the data. No wipe is absolutely perfect." Uiharu said.

"We're going to force a restore. From only ghost packets and the files no longer on the directory." Hikaru said. "In a hostile system that has an active wipe in place."

"That sounds hard." Saten said.

"It's impossible." Hikaru said.

"Completely undoable." Uiharu agreed.

"So, I'm guessing it'll take you two ten minutes?" Shirai said dryly.

Uiharu giggled, and Hikaru smiled. "Give or take."

"I'm going to check out the scene of the disappearance." Saten said. "I've got an eye for clues and interesting things, and sometimes people are more willing to gossip with a stranger than they are to tell something to an officer. I might be able to uncover something that Shirai missed."

"Take Katashi with you." Shirai said. "He might recognize something from Hibiki that we wouldn't even think about." she paused. "And I've finished the report. Depending on how slow the day is, we could have fifteen more people on the case in the next ten minutes."

"Is there any way we can track where her cellphone went?" Kazuki asked.

"They'll have taken it away from her or destroyed it long ago." Shirai said.

"Yeah, but not instantly." Kazuki said. "We might be able to see the start of their route, before they ditched it. That'll tell us if they traveled out of the sight of surveillance or if they modified the feeds afterwards."

"She was heading to an unfamiliar store." Hikaru said. "She'd have had a GPS app running. We probably have really good tracking data, if we can find where the requests were stored."

"I need you focused!" Uiharu said. "I'm losing the threads here!"

"Sorry!" Hikaru turned back to her screen.

"I'm checking with Anti-skill. They'll have the requests stored, and we have her number, so we can look up the packets even without her name." Shirai said.

"Come on." Saten waved Kazuki forward. "Time to become detectives!"

"I've got the first responses." Shirai said. "It looks like we've got help."

Hikaru couldn't help but smile. Things were bad, but with a team like this working, she had full confidence that they would manage to find Sayaka in no time. "We're coming for you. Just hang on, Sayaka." Hikaru said quietly.

A red box flashed up on Shirai's screen, and her entire expression crumbled in an instant.

"What's wrong?" Kazuki asked.

"Anti-skill just sent me a C&D in response to my request." Shirai said. "They advise us to stop looking for Hibiki Sayaka."

Silence fell in the room, where creative energy had been bursting just seconds before. No one moved or said a word, their tasks idling as they ceased activity. Only Shirai seemed at all animate, and even her movements were slow and deliberate. She looked at Uiharu, then over at Kazuki and Hikaru. She seemed hesitant, like she didn't quite know what to do. The silence dragged on. "This case is officially closed." she said after an eternity. "It's out of our hands now." she sighed and sat down.

"That's it?" Kazuki asked. "Sayaka…"

"Never existed in the first place." Shirai said. "And Judgment doesn't chase after imaginary individuals."

"So you're just going to give up?" Saten asked.

"We don't have any other choice." Shirai said. "We've been given a direct warning. If we keep on this case, we'll be kicked from Judgement or even arrested, though the second one is unlikely."

"But you know she's real." Hikaru said. "She was real enough to annoy you for the past two weeks!"

"Of course I know!" Shirai said angrily. "But I can't do anything about it! I have enough to deal with without the threat of being kicked out of Judgement. There's no ambiguity in the warning. We've been ordered to stop, no buts. Something is really messed up here, but we have to follow the rules."

"The rules are wrong!" Hikaru said.

"The rules are the rules." Shirai said. "Right or wrong has nothing to do with it." she looked like she was about to hit something, her face a mask of quiet rage. "I'm sorry. We can't help you." her voice nearly broke as she spoke, her tone so full of self-loathing that Hikaru was almost willing to forgive her.

Hikaru shook violently, blue flashes of light sparking in and out of existence around her as she struggled to keep herself calm. Kazuki held her hand, and she slowly managed to control her breathing, standing up and bowing curtly to the room. "Thank you for your assistance." Hikaru said. "We'll be leaving now."

Kazuki and Hikaru walked slowly out of the building. Hikaru's mind was spinning from what had just happened. A C&D from Anti-skill? That meant whoever had Sayaka was connected to the higher-ups in the city. This was just about the last thing she's hoped to find out, but it was a clue at least. And the erasing of Sayaka's records meant that whoever it was had good reason to suspect other people would come looking for her. They had leads, as tenuous as they might be.

Hikaru knew that she needed more information. She would hate to break her streak of white-hat only exploits, but, well, Uiharu had helpfully given her the Anti-skill server keycodes. It was too good of an opportunity to pass up. Hikaru touched her wrist, then rolled her eyes.

"Of course. I forgot my USB nub back in the office." Hikaru said.

"Yes, you did." Uiharu said, out of breath from having run to catch up to them. She approached Hikaru, returning her small device. "Oh, oops." she said nonchalantly. "I might have forgotten to erase the server keycodes when I finished." she gave Hikaru a look. She seemed to be teetering on the edge of saying something more, but she shrunk back before she did.

This could be the last chance she had to reach out for help, and Hikaru knew it. She carefully weighed her options, then decided to see just how much strain this new friendship could take.

"Uiharu." Hikaru said. "I can't ask you to help us with this in good faith, but if you wouldn't mind keeping out an eye for us, maybe send a note or two our way if you just happen across something…"

Uiharu looked over her shoulder at the security cameras, and then back to Hikaru. "I told you I'd find her, right?" Uiharu said. "I don't break promises."

Hikaru couldn't help it. She hugged the older girl. "Thank you." she whispered. "There aren't really words for this feeling of relief and hope you've given me, Uiharu."

"Hey!" Saten walked up behind Uiharu and, in a fluid motion, flipped her skirt into the air. Hikaru immediately stepped back from Uiharu and looked at Saten with a curious gaze. Uiharu squeaked, then turned to Saten.

"You really ruined the moment, Saten!" she admonished.

"Well, I figure if we're going to be in on a secret conspiracy, we should act as carefree as possible." she winked at Hikaru. "We are in on a secret conspiracy, right?"

"I suppose if you want to put it that way." Hikaru said.

"Most of that back there was acting for the camera." Saten said. "Shirai is already putting together a corruption inquiry. Part of Judgement's job is to detect and combat corruption in Anti-skill, after all. She's still got on the books ways of fighting back. But I'm guessing we're up for some more off the books work?"

"I suppose we are." Hikaru said.

"Well, Katashi, it's about time we took that walk of ours." Saten said. "We'll go and check out the site of disappearance like planned."

"I have to go back to work." Uiharu said. "We're getting more cases coming in, and I can't be suspiciously absent. But I'll do what I can when I can."

"I'll see if I can finish what we started." Hikaru said, nodding at Uiharu. "If I can't manage a data restore, I'll try to find where the wipe came from. If we can get any concrete information, we can trace it back step by step until we find the source. We just need a line of inquiry to start with."

"We should agree to meet up again tomorrow. Somewhere we all know." Saten said.

"How about that park in district 15 we met the first time?" Hikaru asked.

"I don't know where that is." Kazuki said.

"I'll show you." Hikaru promised.

"That sounds good. We can meet there. 12:00?" Saten asked.

"Should be fine." Hikaru said.

"Hopefully we'll have found something by then." Saten said. "See you tomorrow, I guess."

"Yeah." Hikaru played with the USB nub between her fingers, letting herself feel hopeful for a moment despite everything. "See you tomorrow."

"Hikaru." Kazuki said, locking eyes with her. "Sayaka's okay. I'm not just saying that. No one goes through the trouble of wiping all records of a person if they were just going to kill them. We have time."

"I know." Hikaru said. "I'm just… scared."

"So am I." Kazuki said.

"Come on." Saten led Kazuki away. "We've got a street to search."

"Good luck!" Uiharu called. A few seconds later, she sighed and turned back to her office building. "This isn't your fault." she said to Hikaru quietly, not facing her. "I know this situation is terrible, but you mustn't blame yourself. Not for what happened to Sayaka, not for how long it took to figure out there was a problem, not for getting Shirai and Saten and myself involved with this. You've done nothing wrong."

Hikaru nodded, though she knew Uiharu couldn't see her, and began to walk away. Uiharu turned around briefly to look at her, then entered the building slowly. Hikaru took a deep breath, still doing her best to force herself to remain calm. She had a lot of work to do.

-:(&):-

"You look awful." Kazuki said, sitting down across from Hikaru.

"I feel awful." Hikaru said dejectedly. "And the worst part is that I know that this is only the beginning."

"I'm guessing the hacking didn't go so well?" Kazuki asked.

"My laptop has been bricked." Hikaru said. "I figured out nothing, and they traced me back and broke my defenses. I literally had to smash the computer with a hammer to make sure they couldn't find my physical location. I wasn't going to take the chance at that point." she let out a sigh. "So, not only did the hacking 'not go well', it went so poorly that we're worse off now than we were before I started."

"Saten thinks she might have found something." Kazuki said. "But I wouldn't get my hopes up. I saw what she'd 'found', and for the life of me it looked like a normal rock. I don't think any of the 'evidence' we gathered is actually useful." he paused. "Though, I did make sure to take as many pictures of the scene as I could while I was there. I've got about three hundred images for you. If there were any clues left behind, you'd be the one who'd be able to find them, so I made sure to document it in as untouched a state as I could."

"Thanks for that." Hikaru said. "Once I get a new computer, I can take a look at those."

"We're in this pretty deep, aren't we." Kazuki said. It wasn't really a question.

"Yeah, we are. And this is just eight hours in, before we even discovered any important secrets." she laughed nervously. "Look what's happened, huh? Here I was, just trying to keep my nose clean, but trouble simply won't leave us alone, will it? This is just the start. Whatever is going on here isn't small. And, Kazuki, I really don't want to think about it, but the fact of the matter is that this is the easy part. Dodging discovery while searching for clues, trying to uncover what's going on; this is the low danger part. Assuming we find her, we're going to actually have to try to pull off a rescue at some point." Hikaru put her head in her hands. "We're in over our heads. Way, way over our heads. I don't think we can succeed." she paused. "Maybe it would be for the best if we just gave up. A missing ten year old is better than a missing ten year old, two dead ten year olds and two dead twelve year olds. We're not going to help anyone going off on a suicide mission."

Kazuki looked at Hikaru, searching her face carefully. "Are you going to stop?" he asked calmly at length, as if he already knew the answer.

Hikaru growled with frustration, then sighed, defeated. "No, but I was hoping you would." she said dejectedly.

"I'm not that worried." Kazuki said. "They might have resources and time on their side, but we have you. I know what team I'd rather be on."

Hikaru shook her head. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm not all that great when it comes to practical application. I'm plenty smart, but I'm not all that creative. That comes with experience, which is something that I really don't have. Maybe you should be worried, if you're placing faith in me. I'm pretty sure I'm far, far short of what is needed." she looked at Kazuki. "Kazuki, please. Think about it. You're a level 0 ten year old boy. I hate to say it, but there isn't much you'll be able to contribute, anyway. You really can sit this one out. I'd be happier knowing that at least one of my friends will make it through this, even if I end up failing spectacularly."

"The moment you give up, I will." Kazuki said. "But until you stop putting yourself in danger, I'm going to keep following you in."

"That is both incredibly sweet and incredibly stupid." Hiakru said, but she couldn't stop herself from smiling slightly.

"I don't really think so." Kazuki said. "I'm no super-genius, but I'm not dull. I understand the risks involved. I'm not just following you blindly. I know the stakes, I'm aware of the consequences. But I'd rather have supported you and lose than have sat out and let you fall on your own."

Hikaru cast her eyes upwards. "What did I do to get friends this good, exactly?" she asked the air, letting her fear pass through and out of her mind.

"Probably supporting us to the same degree." Kazuki said. "This is, after all, the second time in thirty days you're putting your life at risk for Sayaka. I'd imagine you'd do the same for me, though I'd really rather we never have to test that. Is it really that odd that we'd be willing to do the same for you?"

"That was supposed to be rhetorical." Hikaru said. She rubbed her eyes, determination flooding back into her. "Thanks, Kazuki. I had no idea how much I needed that. You're right. We will support each other, no matter what. And that means I need to spend less time worrying and more time working. There's always something to be fixed, improved. Sitting around depressed won't get us anywhere."

"I'll give you my computer, if you'd like." Kazuki said.

"Good idea." Hikaru nodded. "Leave you cellphone here, too. I'll start looking at the pictures. With all the information we're pulling in, we have to find something. No one is perfect, and we just need one clue to start taking this apart."

"I'll also bring you something to eat." Kazuki said.

"Already covered." Hikaru lifted an empty box with her off hand, flipping through Kazuki's pictures. "I am the type to work longer than is probably healthy mentally, but when it really matters I'm good at keeping myself physically healthy. This is going to be a long term problem, and I need to be just as lucid and productive two weeks from now as I am today. That means at least two meals and seven hours of sleep per night, no matter what." Hikaru paused, turning her full attention to the pictures for a moment. She flipped back and forth between a few, then shook her head. "I thought I saw something…" she muttered.

"That's a relief." Kazuki said. "Though, I suppose I shouldn't have been worried. It is you we're taking about. You don't really make stupid choices."

"If only that were true." Hikaru sighed. "Speaking of which, I would like some coffee, if you can get it. Between last night's all-nighter and the three hours I got in class, I don't have enough energy to keep me active for much longer. And, seeing as today is when the clues will be the freshest, I need to figure out everything we need to verify and verify them as soon as possible. Analysis can come later, but we need to get all the time sensitive data now, before it's lost."

"I'll see what I can do." Kazuki promised. "Anything else I can help with?"

"I'd like you to get some sleep." Hikaru said. "You've been up thirty-six hours now, and I need you lucid." she smiled. "Not out of kindness, mind. I'm going to bed at 01:00, and I'll need you awake then to take over and actually go out and find the data I've identified as important. I don't want you missing anything."

"I suppose I can spare five hours for sleep." Kazuki said.

"I don't know about you, but I'm not going to the last day of classes." Hikaru said. "I think this warrants playing hooky for."

"Oh, yay. I guess our summer vacation starts tomorrow, then." Kazuki said dryly. "How wonderful."

"Well, you can't say we won't have a productive summer." Hikaru said. "You go and get that computer and coffee, okay? And, Kazuki? Thank you for sticking with me."

"It couldn't have gone any other way." Kazuki said. He gave Hikaru one last worried but hopeful look, then exited the basement workshop and into the dorms proper. Hikaru watched him go, then turned back to the cellphone.

"There's going to be something." she muttered. "There has to be…"

-:(&):-

"We're still at square zero." Saten said, shaking her head. "I thought that I might have had something, but when I examined the evidence more closely, my clues became harder and harder to justify."

"I've had a ton of work." Uiharu said, looking ashamed. "I really wish I could have done more, but with the system denying all inquiries on Hibiki Sayaka, it hasn't been easy."

"You're saving other people." Hikaru said. "Hibiki isn't your only problem. We're grateful for whatever you can provide."

"Unfortunately, nothing yet." Uiharu said. "Or, nothing concrete. I found the username of the person who blocked the search requests, but it didn't lead anywhere. Even without a direct trace, I might be able to determine what terminal they used, when they used it, and then get security footage. But that's going to take a lot of time, a lot of lucky guesswork, and even if I do find it I'll still have to convince them to actually give me the footage."

"Well, that's something, at least." Hikaru said. "Right now, that's our only clue. I looked over the pictures of the scene that Kazuki took, and I can't find anything useful in them at all. I spent hours trying to think of other ways we could track her, but I came up empty." Hikaru felt herself hesitating, like there was more to say about the pictures, but her mind drew blank.

"How did the cracking go, by the way?" Uiharu asked, and Hikaru snapped back to attention.

"She's using my computer now." Kazuki said.

"Oh." Uiharu paused. "That doesn't sound very good."

"Yeah." Hikaru sighed. "I'm good, but I'm not that good. Anti-skill's server defense was hard enough to break on its own without fighting the cyber defense of whoever set this thing up. I couldn't even come close to handling both at once."

"So, we have nothing yet?" Saten said. "That's…" she shook her head. "We'll just have to keep looking." she smiled, though Hikaru could tell it was forced. "We will find Sayaka."

"I knew something was wrong." Hikaru turned to see Misaka approaching. "Sayaka's missing?"

"What are you doing here?" Uiharu said nervously. It was obvious from their expressions that Misaka's arrival came as just as much a surprise to Uiharu and Saten as it did to Kazuki and Hikaru.

"I've known something was wrong since Kuroko came back to the dorms." Misaka said. "She wouldn't tell me what had happened at Judgment, and said that I should ask you about it. She seemed upset." Misaka paused. "I went to talk to you about it today, but on the way to you I noticed you and Saten walking together with really serious looks, so I followed you to see what was going on. I meant to catch up and ask you what was happening, but I lost you at one point and didn't find you again until you'd already made it here and started talking with Hikaru. At that point, I figured that I might as well listen." she paused. "So, I'll ask again. Is Sayaka missing?"

"Yes." Hikaru said. "She disappeared at 15:24 on the sixteenth, two days ago."

"And you didn't ask for help finding her?" Misaka asked.

"Well, we didn't realize it until about noon yesterday." Hikaru said. "And, actually, I did ask for help." she gestured at Uiharu and Saten.

"Well, you didn't ask for my help." Misaka said. She seemed almost hurt, for some reason.

"I figured you wouldn't be interested." Hikaru said. Misaka looked even more hurt. "Obviously I was wrong." Hikaru said quickly. "I certainly don't object to your involvement. If you're willing to help us, I would be more than happy to have your help."

"Who is she?" Kazuki whispered to Saten.

"That's Misaka Mikoto, the Railgun." Saten replied.

"Oh." Kazuki said. "Right."

"Oh, yeah. Oops." Misaka took a step forward, extending a hand to Kazuki. "I'm Misaka. You must be Kazuki, right?"

Tentatively, Kazuki shook Misaka's hand. "Yeah." he said. He seemed a little stunned. Hikaru rolled her eyes. Why was everyone else so star-struck by this girl?

Misaka turned back to Uiharu. "I don't get what Kuroko was so upset about, or why she didn't just tell me this."

"We got a C&D order from Anti-skill telling us to abandon the case." Uiharu said. "Um, if I have to guess, she didn't want to get you involved."

Misaka blinked. "Why wouldn't she want..."

"This is not a productive line of questioning." Hikaru said, sighing. This was not the time for such discussions. "With a fifth person on the case, we have that much more of a chance of succeeding. Unfortunately, catching you up won't take very long."

"We've figured basically nothing out." Saten clarified. "We don't have any good leads on who, where, or why they took her."

"Nothing?" Misaka asked.

"Nothing." Saten said, nodding.

"We've already checked the security cameras in the area, but they don't capture the event." Uiharu said. "Saten and Katashi raked the site of disappearance for clues, and Hikaru tried to hack into the Anti-skill servers to find information with little success." Uiharu paused. "Also, Hibiki's personal data has been wiped from all Academy City records. She's not just missing; someone has done their best to make it seem as if Hibiki Sayaka never existed in the first place. I might have found some lead on the person who made the wipe, but I'm still days away from confirming who they are. And, even then, the person responsible for the wipe might not be directly related to the people who took Hibiki away."

"What's the plan now, then?" Misaka asked.

"I'll try to follow through on my trace." Uiharu said. "It's all we have for now. As for the rest..."

"We keep trying." Hikaru said, clenching her fists. "We keep trying until something gives. No defense is perfect. No problem is unsolvable. The answers might take effort, and the results might not be what you wished for, but solutions always exist."

"I don't know if I can really be of much use." Misaka said. "If you need more feet on the ground, I'm more than willing, but it doesn't look like that will help any." she seemed lost, coming to terms with the fact that she was nearly powerless to help, as much as she might have wanted to. Uiharu seemed lost in thought, her face a mask of worry as she played concentric circles of disrepair in her mind. Kazuki's eyes were watering up, the hopelessness of the situation finally starting to get to him.

"This is such an awful situation, huh?" Saten said, smiling wryly. "Of course, now is exactly when things start looking up. We're out of luck, no paths to take; this is when, out of nowhere, help arrives. That's how these things always go." she grinned. "We've just got to push through for a few more hours, and then someone will be contacted by a mysterious entity or find a hidden clue and suddenly we'll be off to start the adventure proper." Hikaru could tell the mirth was false, but she understood the sentiment. Despite the fact that she knew that Saten's proclamation had no bearing in reality, she let herself believe it for a few seconds. She needed to believe it, or she'd lose all hope.

"This isn't a manga, Saten." Uiharu said. "The real world doesn't work that way."

"I don't know." Hikaru said, smiling weakly. "After all, stories are based off reality, at least to some extent. There's always a grain of truth in the mythos of fiction."

Saten nodded. "Yeah, exactly. It won't be as neat or obvious as in in a book, but it's bound to happen."

"We just have to keep trying." Kazuki said, nodding along, wiping the tears from where they had begun to pool under his eyes. "We're bound to find something eventually, even if just through random chance."

"I'll see if I can find anything out myself." Misaka affirmed. "You've covered most angles, but I've always had a knack for attracting trouble. Maybe I'll happen upon something."

"We can't give up, can we?" Uiharu said, steeling her gaze. "I joined Judgement to help people, after all. If there's a lost girl out there, it's my duty to find her."

"And we will find her." Saten said. "We just have to keep trying, that's all."

"I'll look over the photos again. Maybe I missed something." Hikaru said.

"I'll help." Kazuki said immediately. "At the very least I'll be able to take notes for you to free you for thinking, and, who knows? I might spot something."

"I'll see if there are any urban legends about disappearing children." Saten said. "These things have been disturbingly accurate recently, and maybe someone else has picked up at least a clue to start us with."

"We can do this." Hikaru said, trying to convince herself more than anyone else. "We're not out of options." she forced her fears down, steeling herself for another round of likely fruitless searching. "We've only been looking for one day. We will find Hibiki Sayaka."

Hikaru looked down at her shoes as her eyes began to water. "We will find you. I will find you. I promise." she whispered.

-:(&):-

"It's hopeless!" Hikaru cried, slamming her fists into her desk. Kazuki looked up, shocked, concern flashing across his face. Hikaru slammed her head onto the desk hard, yelling in a burst of pure rage and despair. "Three days of searching, and we've come up with nothing at all!" she looked up at Kazuki, her eyes empty and lifeless. "Even if there is a trace somewhere, by this point whatever plan they've got Sayaka for has already begun. Even if we find a starting clue, at this point we're so hopelessly far behind that they'll have moved her location, changed experiments, and passed her to a different organization by the time we figure out who her first kidnappers were!" she felt only emptiness inside, a sadness that was too deep for tears laying heavy on her heart. "Did we ever have a chance?" she said quietly. "Whoever has her is obviously hyper-competent and has access to astounding resources. We're kids. It was stupid to even try."

"No." Kazuki said.

"What do you mean, no!?" Hikaru yelled. "And don't give me some saccharine speech about the power of friendship and the value of never giving up. We've gotten nowhere, Kazuki. We don't have a single clue. Even Uiharu's potential trace, our only half-decent tangential lead, turned out to be faulty!"

"I mean no." Kazuki said flatly. "Hikaru, you want me to support you, but honestly, I can't. I'm falling apart too; I can barely support myself. But you've already decided that you aren't going to stop, right?" he looked her dead in the eyes. "You want more help, because you're a ten year old girl who really shouldn't be operating as well as you're managing. You've taken a weight that most people in general couldn't bear, let alone kids our age. But, really, right now, Sayaka doesn't have the time for these self-pitying outbursts. If you're going to give up, fine. I don't blame you. If you weren't working there, right next to me, I'd have already stopped. This _is_ too much. But if you're not actually going to stop, shut up and get back to work, because we can't keep having these breakdowns. You're tearing me down every time you pause like this, and I don't know how long I'm going to be able to keep it up at this rate. And you obviously aren't in a position to help anyone. So, Hikaru, decide. Are you in this, or are you done? Because I'm done with these talks." he turned away. "The position markings should be finished in ten minutes."

Hikaru breathed in slowly, calming herself with extreme effort. It wasn't fair, but fair didn't have anything to do with it. You either rose to the challenge or fell behind. That was how life worked. Nothing came without effort, and the person working never decides the effort to reward ratio.

It was time to put childish things behind her.

Hikaru walked up to the corner of the room, propping a white-board against the wall. She grabbed a marker off of a nearby desk, took a deep breath, and began to write. Kazuki watched her out of the corner of his eye, expectant. After about thirty seconds, Hikaru stepped back from the board, placing her marker down. On the board, three statements stared back at her.

 _There is always a way to win._

 _Failure is never an option._

 _Therefore, success is guaranteed._

"What do we have?" Hikaru asked, not turning around.

"Almost nothing." Kazuki said. "We have a few hundred pictures taken a day after the scene of the crime, we know that Sayaka's data has been wiped for some reason, our access to information and resources are being cut off by Anti-skill, and we're burned out, exhausted, and hopeless."

Hikaru smiled weakly. "I don't know. Fifteen minutes?"

"This is you we're talking about." Kazuki said. He couldn't keep from smiling, either. "Ten."

Hikaru closed her eyes, thinking for a moment. There had to be something. There always was. For the first time in days, she let herself just relax, to think of nothing for a moment as she forced her mental state to refresh. Twenty seconds of silence passed.

Hikaru's eyes flashed open, and she spun around quickly. "Hold on!" she said, walking briskly over and taking the laptop from Kazuki. She flashed through the images, letting her mind build the scene as she had done many times before. This time, however, it wasn't what was in the pictures that interested her.

"How did I miss this!" she said. "Kazuki, there's an eighteen centimeter by fifteen centimeter patch of pavement that none of your pictures capture."

"That's not possible." Kazuki said. "I was really careful to document everything."

Hikaru shook her head. "No, it's not just that. You took three hundred and fifteen pictures of a thirty square meter area, and you did it from both inside and outside of the area on more than sufficient angles to build a perfect panorama. It's not just 'impossible' that you missed a patch of ground in the sense that you'd have had to be braindead to do it – it's actually, honest to goodness physically not a possibility."

"What are you saying?" Kazuki asked.

"Your pictures capture the whole scene." Hikaru said. "They have to. With the angles and locations these pictures were taken from, it's not possible for any point of three dimensional space in that area to not be imaged. Which leads to only one possible explanation." Hikaru looked up at Kazuki. "It's not that the patch isn't imaged. It's that we can't see the patch. Our brains have blacked it out."

There was a brief pause. Kazuki looked up at her. "How much do you want to bet that that was what Saten kept finding as a clue, and then just blanking out before she could get it?" he asked.

"We've actually found something, haven't we?" Hikaru said, a little giddy.

"It's better than nothing." Kazuki said. "If it's really an object hiding itself, then it should still be there. No one would remember to move it."

"Take me there, now." Hikaru said.

Kazuki nodded, leading Hikaru out of the dorms and into the city beyond. Hikaru blinked in the light of the setting sun, having not expected it to be present. She was really losing track of time. Luckily, the spot wasn't far, as the disappearance had occurred just outside of their school. Hikaru's heart sank as she scanned the scene, but she forced herself to think rationally, past what her eyes told her.

"There's nothing." Kazuki said.

"Yeah. Which is exactly what we'd expect." Hikaru said, reaching down. She felt around where she knew the blank patch had to be, and her hand came in contact with an object. She resisted the urge to look at it; the memory would simply blank out, and she'd waste who knows how long looking at it, turning away, forgetting, and then looking again. "I've got it." she said.

"Okay." Kazuki nodded. "Let's get it back to the lab."

Hikaru nodded. She picked up the object and carried it back to the lab, making as good time as they were able. Once she had placed it down on the table, she sat down in one of the chairs, exhausted.

"Now what?" Kazuki said. "It's in the lab, but we can't remember it or anything about it."

"Yeah, but only to one degree of separation." Hikaru said. "For instance, I feel exhausted, which means that it has to be heavy but not too heavy for me to carry on my own. It also has to be small enough to fit on the table. It doesn't have sharp edges, because I'm not cut, and it's not covered in any residue, because my hands are still clean. It doesn't make loud noise, because we're not having to yell to talk."

"This is going to take a while, isn't it?" Kazuki said.

"Yeah, but we can do it." Hikaru said. "I'm going to see what else we can figure out. Take notes for me, will you?" she smiled. "We've finally found something. Kazuki, we have a real clue."

"I know." he looked at Hikaru, smiling. "Only you could have found something that specifically makes itself undiscoverable."

"I'm just upset that it took me so long." Hikaru said. "But I'm not going to let this happen again. You were right. I knew that I was in this for the long haul. I shouldn't have let my feelings get so out of control that they clouded my thoughts like this."

"Hikaru, you're a ten year old girl. No one expects you to be a robot." Kazuki said. "What's important is that you dealt with it, and you're back to full now."

"And I'm not losing sight of what matters again." Hikaru said. "Worrying about what's happening isn't a productive use of time. The only way to make things better is to work on them." she paused. "As I should be, right now, with the object." she paused again.

"Did it derail our conversation to make you forget about it?" Kazuki asked.

"Maybe." Hikaru said. "This thing is insidious."

"It's never met someone like you." Kazuki said, taking out a notepad. "So, first question. Is it round?"

"Hm…" Hikaru walked up to the table, feeling the object. She looked at it a few times, trying to see if she could create any negative space. "No, it's definitely not round…"

-:(&):-

Hikaru rubbed her eyes, carefully marking down notes on the object's status. Kazuki had fallen asleep already, but she had pressed on. So far, they knew that the object was a briefcase, and that there was a speaker and a tape in the briefcase along with a complex collection of wires and circuit boxes that Hikaru had to assume were a power source of some kind. It had taken nearly four hours to figure out as much as they had, and Hikaru was struggling, bit by bit, to build the power source and play the tape.

The whole thing struck her as strange. She was almost certain that this had to have something to do with Sayaka's disappearance, but she couldn't figure out how they were connected. It didn't really make sense for them to leave her a clue tape, after all. That was the way insane movie villains worked, not people in real life. At least, not people who wanted to stay hidden. There wasn't any reason for them to leave any kind of calling card, even if they thought it was impossible to find. Why run the risk of being discovered?

There was a click, and Hikaru turned her head to the case. She looked away again quickly, before she lost the memories, then paused as she realized that she was capable of remembering it still. She turned back, facing the case. It was a briefcase, just like they had deduced, painted silver. The power source had been put together correctly, apparently triggering a shut off of whatever had made the case impossible to recall.

Hikaru felt a nervous energy building in her stomach. She looked over to Kazuki, hesitant. She could wake him, but he needed his sleep. She could wait until morning, but that risked the case erasing itself from memory again. She looked down at the case, unsure of her next move. What happened next could give them exactly what they needed… or it could be nothing but a trick, a false clue set up to put them off the trail. Hikaru stood perfectly still, the case open in front of her, feeling the eternity of seconds pass by her as the world seemed to lean in around, looking over her shoulder as she postponed action.

Carefully, Hikaru picked up the tape. It was one of those old magnetic audio tapes, the kind that hadn't been used in the outside world for over a decade, let alone in Academy City. Slowly, she inserted the tape into a slot below the speaker. The tape was drawn in, and there was a whirring noise for a moment as it was locked into place.

The speaker emitted a low crackle of static, and then fuzzy, quiet background noise. Hikaru could tell that the audio was playing, though it was both terribly quiet and of very low sound quality. Unsurprising, given the medium.

The tape rolled through another fifty seconds of silence, and Hikaru felt the nervous pit in her stomach grow. Could this be it? Was even their only clue rendered useless, or simply a distraction?

 _"Ooh, sorry about that."_ a voice said from the tape, and Hikaru snapped to attention. _"Someone walked by just as I started recording, and given what I'm doing here, I figured a little wait was a better choice."_ the voice sounded like that of an older teenage girl, somewhere between sixteen and nineteen years old. There was a pause, and then the voice sighed heavily, reluctant. _"What I'm about to say could get me, you, and your friend killed. So, Hikaru, listen closely. Because I'm only going to say it once."_

 **Author's Note:** For those of you wondering when the events in this story could have possibly taken place, this is an alternate timeline where the Level Upper arc starts about three weeks sooner, so school was still in at the time. It had just finished the day before the Railgun girls met Hikaru and Sayaka. Sayaka goes missing on the sixteenth of June, and Monday the nineteenth is the last day of classes, summer vacation starts on the twentieth like normal. Also, because of the shift, I'm moving the start of the Sister's arc up by three weeks as well, to the twenty-third of June.

Basically, I forgot that school had let out by now and don't want to have to rework my timeline. This should fix things. Sorry for any confusion.


End file.
